Function-as-a-service for two-way communication systems

ABSTRACT

The present disclosure relates generally to systems and methods for facilitating two-way communication sessions using serverless cloud-based functions configured in a function-as-a-service (FaaS) system. One example includes accessing a template configured to execute a response based on an event, facilitating a two-way communication session with a user device, and processing data of the two-way communication session to identify an event trigger corresponding to the template. Execution of a serverless cloud-based function associated with the event trigger is requested, and one or more outputs of the serverless cloud-based function associated with the event trigger are integrated into the two-way communication session.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 17/119,445 filed Dec. 11, 2020, which claims the prioritybenefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 62/948,038, filed onDec. 13, 2019, the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated byreference in their entirety for all purposes.

FIELD

The present disclosure relates generally to two-way communications, suchas those involving a call center. More specifically, techniques areprovided to deploy a serverless function-as-a-service (FaaS) platformintegrated with a communication environment to provide serverlesscloud-based functions to facilitate or improve a two-way communicationsession.

BACKGROUND

Companies tailor generic software-as-a-service (SaaS) platforms to theirbrand specific needs. SaaS platforms typically result in custom featureand enhancement requests, many of which are related to integration withthe company's own backend systems. These feature requests are complex toimplement and require a significant amount of time to procuredomestically and internationally, making the entire process veryexpensive and slow, thereby failing to fulfill customer needs in atimely manner.

Moreover, past environments are not designed specifically for a contactcenter industry. Past environments are agnostic to a specific set of usecases or specific industries. The main goal of existing environments isto offer execution runtime for certain programming languages. Forexample, Amazon Lambda, allows deployment of a JavaScript Function bymeans of a unique uniform resource locator (URL). For example, bycalling a URL, the Function received from the URL is executed and theFunction developer gets charged for the execution time.

SUMMARY

The term embodiment and like terms are intended to refer broadly to allof the subject matter of this disclosure and the claims below.Statements containing these terms should be understood not to limit thesubject matter described herein or to limit the meaning or scope of theclaims below. Embodiments of the present disclosure covered herein aredefined by the claims below, not this summary. This summary is ahigh-level overview of various aspects of the disclosure and introducessome of the concepts that are further described in the DetailedDescription section below. This summary is not intended to identify keyor essential features of the claimed subject matter, nor is it intendedto be used in isolation to determine the scope of the claimed subjectmatter. The subject matter should be understood by reference toappropriate portions of the entire specification of this disclosure, anyor all drawings and each claim.

Examples described herein relate to “serverless” computing. Serverlesscomputing is a cloud computing execution model in which a cloud providerruns a server, while a user of the cloud provider operates without aserver managed by the user (e.g., the user is serverless by relying onservers of a cloud provider). Serverless computing allows dynamicmanagement of machine resources from the cloud provider. Examplesdescribed herein provide improved serverless operations for two-waycommunication systems. Examples improve the operations of two-waycommunication systems and devices in such a system by combining eventmanagement and serverless code templates in a dynamically managed FaaSplatform that can be accessed to improve real-time automation andmachine assistance for agents in a two-way communication session.Additionally, unlike a SaaS platform that is explicitly based on callinga uniform resource locator (URL) over a wide area network (WAN) such asthe Internet, examples described herein allow flexible invocation thatcan correspond to an event in a two-way communication session, improvingthe operation of devices and networks in a two-way communication system.

For example, devices in a communication system can use natural languageprocessing (NLP) to identify events in a two-way communication, and canthen call functions from a FaaS system to assist with the two-waycommunication. Different system implementations can use different intentgroupings and categories of functions. For example, one function can beconfigured for addressing user questions related to medicine, andanother function can be configured to provide user support for ahardware device. Such systems may additionally have further specializedfunctions. While a communication system for a medical system may havedifferent associated functions for event triggers such as “schedule anappointment”, “get test results”, and “refill a prescription”, a devicesupport system can have functions for alternative categories such as“get operating instructions”, “request warranty repairs”, “speak with atechnician”, or “get troubleshooting assistance”. Each of these events,when identified using a trigger template in a two-way communicationsession, can be used to call a serverless function from a cloud-basedFaaS system. The use of such a serverless system allows thecommunication management system to dynamically allocate resources basedon a system load that can vary dramatically over time. Additionally, byconfiguring serverless function templates in a FaaS system, updates toavailable functions can be made in the FaaS cloud by updatingcloud-based templates while the two-way communication system operates,allowing updated functions to be accessed when ready via the cloud,rather than dealing with in-system updates.

Certain examples of the present disclosure include acomputer-implemented method. The method may include accessing a templateconfigured to execute a response based on an event, facilitating atwo-way communication session with a user device, and processing data ofthe two-way communication session to identify an event triggercorresponding to the template. Execution of a serverless cloud-basedfunction associated with the event trigger is requested, and one or moreoutputs of the serverless cloud-based function associated with the eventtrigger are integrated into the two-way communication session.

Additional examples include systems, devices, computer readable media,as well as other implementations described herein. The foregoing,together with other features and embodiments, will become more apparentupon referring to the following specification, claims, and accompanyingdrawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present disclosure is described in conjunction with the appendedFigures:

FIG. 1A shows an example embodiment of a communication system inaccordance with some aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 1B shows an example embodiment of a communication system with aservices cloud including function-as-a-service (FaaS) aspects inaccordance with some aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 2 shows an example embodiment of a communication system inaccordance with some aspects of the present technology;

FIGS. 3A, 3B, and 3C show example embodiments of a communication systemthat includes a connection management system in accordance with someaspects of the present technology;

FIG. 4 shows a representation of a protocol-stack mapping of connectioncomponents' operation in accordance with some aspects of the presenttechnology;

FIG. 5A illustrates aspects of a communication system in accordance withsome aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 5B illustrates aspects of a communication system in accordance withsome aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 6 shows an example embodiment of a connection management system inaccordance with some aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 7 illustrates aspects of a conversation deploying FaaS bot templatein accordance with some aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 8 illustrates an example of properties and configurations offunctions for use in a FaaS system in accordance with some aspects ofthe present technology;

FIG. 9 illustrates an example of a controller bot in accordance withsome aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 10 illustrates aspects of function template creation in accordancewith some aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 11 illustrates an example of editing and creation of a functiontemplate in accordance with aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 12 illustrates aspects of a two-way communication in accordancewith aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 13 illustrates aspects of function deployment and removal, inaccordance with aspects of the present technology;

FIG. 14 shows a flowchart of a method embodiment in accordance with someaspects of the present technology;

FIG. 15 shows a block diagram representing a network environment forenhancing embodiments described herein using machine-learningtechniques;

FIG. 16 illustrates an example computing device that can be used toimplement aspects of an intent driven communication systems inaccordance with some implementations of the present technology.

In the appended figures, similar components and/or features can have thesame reference label. Further, various components of the same type canbe distinguished by following the reference label by a dash and a secondlabel that distinguishes among the similar components. If only the firstreference label is used in the specification, the description isapplicable to any one of the similar components having the same firstreference label irrespective of the second reference label.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The ensuing description provides examples and is not intended to limitthe scope, applicability or configuration of the disclosure. Rather, theensuing description of the examples will provide those skilled in theart with an enabling description for implementing examples. It isunderstood that various changes can be made in the function andarrangement of elements without departing from the spirit and scope asset forth in the appended claims.

Examples described herein relate to communication systems configured toprovide information to users via a two-way communication system. Such acommunication system can include a connection management system to pairusers with agents, to enable the users to be provided information by theagents. In some examples, agents can be human agents, with artificialintelligence (AI) agents, machine analysis driven systems, or anycombination of such agents. Such systems can, for example, use naturallanguage processing (NLP), natural language analysis (NLA), neuralnetworks, and various AI and machine learning tools to analyze andimprove communications systems.

As described herein, such tools can be used to analyze aspects of atwo-way communication for triggers that can be used to call functionsfrom a cloud service. Such functions can be structured as part of afunction-as-a-service (FaaS) system as described herein. As describedabove, by using a serverless cloud based provisioning system forfunctions, operation of a two-way communication system and deviceswithin such a system can be improved. Improvements can includefunctional improvements with combined event management and serverlesscode templates in a dynamically managed FaaS platform that can beaccessed to improve real-time automation and machine assistance foragents in a two-way communication session. The FaaS structures describedcan enable improved dynamic provisioning for a system, both in offeringa variety of functions that can be updated and changed in real-timeduring FaaS system operation, and in allowing individual functions to beupdated dynamically and in real-time during system operation usingserverless cloud provisioning Additionally, unlike an SaaS platform thatis explicitly based on calling a uniform resource locator (URL) over awide area network (WAN) such as the Internet, examples described hereinallow flexible invocation that can correspond to an event in a two-waycommunication session, improving the operation of devices and networksin a two-way communication system with flexible communication options.Various aspects can specifically be used in a communication system witha connection management system to manage increased numbers ofconnections between users and agents, increased numbers of machine or AIagents or machine-based assistance for human agents, and improvedperformance and information quality provided through two-waycommunications.

FIG. 1A shows a block diagram of an embodiment of a communication system100A which implements and supports certain embodiments and featuresdescribed herein. In particular, Certain embodiments relate toestablishing connections between a user device 105 (which can beoperated by a user 110), and a terminal device 115 (which can beoperated by an agent 120) and/or a client device 130 (operated by aclient 125). Connection management system 150 can both assist inmatching user device 105 with terminal device 115, and in assistingaccess to functions called from services cloud 180.

In some embodiments, a user 110 can be an individual browsing a web siteor accessing an online service provided by a remote server 140. In someembodiments, user 110 can be an individual looking to have a serviceperformed on their behalf. Such a service can include having a questionanswered, operating another device, getting help from an agent with atask or service, conducting a transaction, etc.

A client 125 can be an entity that provides, operates, or runs thewebsite or the online service, or individuals employed by or assigned bysuch an entity to perform the tasks available to a client 125 asdescribed herein.

The agent 120 can be an individual, such as a support agent or salesassociate tasked with providing support or information to the user 110regarding the website or online service (e.g., information aboutproducts available at an online store). Out of a large number of agents,a subset of agents may be appropriate for providing support orinformation for a particular client 125. The agent 120 may be affiliatedor not affiliated with the client 125. Each agent can be associated withone or more clients 125. In some non-limiting examples, a user 110 canbe an individual shopping an online store from a personal computingdevice, a client 125 can be a company that sells products online, and anagent 120 can be a sales associate employed by the company. In variousembodiments, the user 110, client 125, and agent 120 can be otherindividuals or entities.

While FIG. 1A shows only a single user device 105, terminal device 115,and client device 130, a communication system 100A can include multipleor many (e.g., tens, hundreds or thousands) of each of one or more ofthese types of devices. Similarly, while FIG. 1A shows only a singleuser 110, agent 120, and client 125, communication system 100A caninclude multiple or many of each of one or more of such entities. Thus,it may be necessary to determine which endpoint is to be selected tocommunicate with a given network device. Further complicating matters, aremote server 140 may also be configured to receive and respond toselect communications with user device 105.

A connection management system 150 can facilitate strategic routing ofcommunications. A communication can include a message with content(e.g., defined based on input from an entity, such as typed or spokeninput). The communication can also include additional data, such as dataabout a transmitting device (e.g., an IP address, account identifier,device type and/or operating system); a destination address; anidentifier of a client; an identifier of a webpage or webpage element(e.g., a webpage or webpage element being visited when the communicationwas generated or otherwise associated with the communication) or onlinehistory data; a time (e.g., time of day and/or date); and/or destinationaddress. Other information can be included in the communication. In someembodiments, connection management system 150 routes the entirecommunication to another device. In some embodiments, connectionmanagement system 150 modifies the communication or generates a newcommunication (e.g., based on the initial communication). The new ormodified communication can include the message (or processed versionthereof), at least some (or all) of the additional data (e.g., about thetransmitting device, webpage or online history and/or time) and/or otherdata identified by connection management system 150 (e.g., account dataassociated with a particular account identifier or device). The new ormodified communication can include other information as well.

Part of strategic-routing facilitation can include establishing,updating and using one or more connections between user device 105 andone or more terminal devices 115. For example, upon receiving acommunication from user device 105, connection management system 150 canestimate to which client (if any) the communication corresponds. Uponidentifying a client, connection management system 150 can identify aterminal device 115 associated with the client for communication withuser device 105. In some embodiments, the identification can includeevaluating a profile of each of a plurality of agents (or experts ordelegates), each agent (e.g., agent 120) in the plurality of agentsbeing associated with a terminal device (e.g., terminal device 115). Theevaluation can relate to a content in a network-device message. Theidentification of the terminal device 115 can include a techniquedescribed, for example, in U.S. application Ser. No. 12/725,799, filedon Mar. 17, 2010, which is hereby incorporated by reference in itsentirety for all purposes.

In some embodiments, connection management system 150 can determinewhether any connections are established between user device 105 and anendpoint associated with the client (or remote server 140) and, if so,whether such channels are to be used to exchange a series ofcommunications including the communication.

Upon selecting an endpoint to communicate with user device 105,connection management system 150 can establish connections between theuser device 105 and the endpoint. In some embodiments, connectionmanagement system 150 can transmit a message to the selected endpoint.The message may request an acceptance of a proposed assignment tocommunicate with a user device 105 or identify that such an assignmenthas been generated. The message can include information about userdevice 105 (e.g., IP address, device type, and/or operating system),information about an associated user 110 (e.g., language spoken,duration of having interacted with client, skill level, sentiment,and/or topic preferences), a received communication, code (e.g., aclickable hyperlink) for generating and transmitting a communication tothe user device 105, and/or an instruction to generate and transmit acommunication to user device 105.

In some embodiments, communications between user device 105 and anendpoint such as a user device can be routed through connectionmanagement system 150. Such a configuration can allow connectionmanagement system 150 to monitor the communication exchange and todetect issues (e.g., as defined based on rules) such asnon-responsiveness of either device or extended latency. Further, such aconfiguration can facilitate selective or complete storage ofcommunications, which may later be used, for example, to assess aquality of a communication exchange and/or to support learning to updateor generate routing rules so as to promote particular post-communicationtargets. As will be described further herein, such configurations canfacilitate management of conversations between user 110 and one or moreendpoints.

In some embodiments, connection management system 150 can monitor thecommunication exchange in real-time and perform automated actions (e.g.,rule-based actions, artificial intelligence originated actions, etc.)based on the live communications. For example, when connectionmanagement system 150 determines that a communication relates to aparticular product, connection management system 150 can automaticallytransmit an additional message to the endpoint containing additionalinformation about the product (e.g., quantity of products in stock,links to support documents related to the product, or other informationabout the product or similar products).

In some embodiments, a designated endpoint can communicate with userdevice 105 without relaying communications through connection managementsystem 150. One or both devices 105, 115 may (or may not) reportparticular communication metrics or content to connection managementsystem 150 to facilitate communication monitoring and/or data storage.

Connection management system 150 may route select communications to aremote server 140 in addition to use of services cloud 180 can beconfigured to provide information in a predetermined manner. Forexample, functions provided by services cloud 180 may access defined oneor more text passages, voice recording and/or files to transmit inresponse to a communication in association with remote server 140. Suchoperations may select a particular text passage, recording or file basedon, for example, an analysis of a received communication (e.g., asemantic or mapping analysis). Examples described herein may usecombinations of FaaS systems in a services cloud in cooperation with aremote server 140 to facilitate or enhance two way communications (e.g.,between a user device 105 and a terminal device 115)

Routing and/or other determinations or processing performed atconnection management system 150 can be performed based on rules and/ordata at least partly defined by or provided by one or more clientdevices 130. For example, client device 130 may transmit a communicationthat identifies a prioritization of agents, terminal-device types,and/or topic/skill matching. As another example, client device 130 mayidentify one or more weights to apply to various variables potentiallyimpacting routing determinations (e.g., language compatibility,predicted response time, device type and capabilities, and/orterminal-device load balancing). It will be appreciated that whichterminal devices and/or agents are to be associated with a client may bedynamic. Communications from client device 130 and/or terminal devices115 may provide information indicating that a given terminal deviceand/or agent is to be added or removed as one associated with a client.For example, client device 130 can transmit a communication with IPaddress and an indication as to whether a terminal device with theaddress is to be added or removed from a list identifyingclient-associated terminal devices.

Each communication (e.g., between devices, between a device andconnection management system 150, between services cloud 180 andconnection management system 150, etc.) can occur over one or morenetworks 170. Any combination of open or closed networks can be includedin the one or more networks 170. Examples of suitable networks includethe Internet, a personal area network, a local area network (LAN), awide area network (WAN), or a wireless local area network (WLAN). Othernetworks may be suitable as well. The one or more networks 170 can beincorporated entirely within or can include an intranet, an extranet, ora combination thereof. In some embodiments, a network in the one or morenetworks 170 includes a short-range communication channel, such as aBluetooth or a Bluetooth Low Energy channel. In one embodiment,communications between two or more systems and/or devices can beachieved by a secure communications protocol, such as secure socketslayer (SSL) or transport layer security (TLS). In addition, data and/ortransactional details may be encrypted based on any convenient, known,or to be developed manner, such as, but not limited to, Data EncryptionStandard (DES), Triple DES, Rivest-Shamir-Adleman encryption (RSA),Blowfish encryption, Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), CAST-128,CAST-256, Decorrelated Fast Cipher (DFC), Tiny Encryption Algorithm(TEA), eXtended TEA (XTEA), Corrected Block TEA (XXTEA), and/or RCS,etc.

A user device 105, terminal device 115, and/or client device 130 caninclude, for example, a portable electronic device (e.g., a smart phone,tablet, laptop computer, or smart wearable device) or a non-portableelectronic device (e.g., one or more desktop computers, smartappliances, servers, and/or processors). Connection management system150 can be separately housed from network, terminal, IOT and clientdevices or may be part of one or more such devices (e.g., viainstallation of an application on a device). Remote server 140 may beseparately housed from each device and connection management system 150and/or may be part of another device or system. While each device,server and system in FIG. 1A is shown as a single device, it will beappreciated that multiple devices may instead be used. For example, aset of network devices can be used to transmit various communicationsfrom a single user, or remote server 140 may include a server stack.

A software agent or application may be installed on and/or executable ona depicted device, system or server. In one instance, the software agentor application is configured such that various depicted elements can actin complementary manners. For example, a software agent on a device canbe configured to collect and transmit data about device usage to aseparate connection management system, and a software application on theseparate connection management system can be configured to receive andprocess the data.

In different examples, a software agent or application operating on userdevice 105 or terminal device 115 can identify triggers that are used tocall functions from services cloud 180 as part of FaaS system operation.In other examples, connection management system 150 can identify suchtriggers. In further embodiments, combinations of any such triggeridentification can occur anywhere in a communication system 100A or 100Bfor different function calls. Particular details of such function callsare described in more detail below.

FIG. 1B shows an example embodiment of a communication system 100B witha services cloud including function-as-a-service (FaaS) aspects inaccordance with some aspects of the present technology. Communicationsystem 100B illustrates alternate aspects of the communication system100 shown as communication system 100A in FIG. 1A. FIG. 1B illustratesan example of a topology of a function-as-a-service (FaaS) cloud systemas FaaS cloud 190 in services cloud 180, in accordance with someexamples. As shown in FIG. 1B, in some situations, the FaaS cloud 190system can utilize a combination of events and serverless code templatesimplemented as functions 191-196 for an improved conversational commercesetting.

The services cloud 180 system can be a serverless environment that canallow brands and companies tailor a conversational commerce platform tosuit their specific business needs with services (e.g., service 181,182, 183, 184, 185, 186) and, in accordance with examples describedherein, functions (e.g., function 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196). TheFaaS cloud 190 system within services cloud 180 as described herein canprovide developers with the tools they need to innovate and rapidlyenhance conversational experiences.

The FaaS cloud 190 platform can implement functions 191-196 (e.g.,code-snippets or templates) on behalf of the customer represented byclient 125 and client device 130. The functions 191-196 can be executedwithin a defined function without the need to for client 125 to set up aclient server to host the functions. The FaaS cloud 190 platform alsocan deploy and execute custom code within a cloud-based system (e.g.,services cloud 180) and be fully integrated into core-systems as part ofa two-way communication system described herein. The FaaS cloud 190system as part of a managed communication system described below canefficient device provisioning and updates, with reduced time andresources to update or deploy bot resources (e.g., combinations ofspecific conversational lifecycle events that can enhance conversationalexperiences in a two-way communication system) or other such functionsin a communication system.

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of another embodiment of a communicationsystem 200. Generally, FIG. 2 illustrates a variety of componentsconfigured and arranged to enable a network device 205 to communicatewith one or more terminal devices 215. The depicted instance includesnine terminal devices 215 included in three local-area networks 235.

In some embodiments, a communication from network device 205 includesdestination data (e.g., a destination IP address) that at least partlyor entirely indicates which terminal device is to receive thecommunication. Communication system 200 can include one or moreinter-network connection components 245 and/or one or more intra-networkconnection components 255 that can process the destination data andfacilitate appropriate routing.

Each inter-network connection components 245 can be connected to aplurality of networks 235 and can have multiple network cards installed(e.g., each card connected to a different network). For example, aninter-network connection component 245 can be connected to a wide-areanetwork 270 (e.g., the Internet) and one or more local-area networks235. In the depicted instance, in order for a communication to betransmitted from network device 205 to any of the terminal devices, inthe depicted system, the communication must be handled by multipleinter-network connection components 245.

When an inter-network connection component 245 receives a communication(or a set of packets corresponding to the communication), inter-networkconnection component 245 can determine at least part of a route to passthe communication to a network associated with a destination. The routecan be determined using, for example, a routing table (e.g., stored atthe router), which can include one or more routes that are pre-defined,generated based on an incoming message (e.g., from another router orfrom another device) or learned.

Examples of inter-network connection components 245 include a router 260and a gateway 265. An inter-network connection component 245 (e.g.,gateway 265) may be configured to convert between network systems orprotocols. For example, gateway 265 may facilitate communication betweenTransmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) andInternetwork Packet Exchange/Sequenced Packet Exchange (IPX/SPX)devices.

Upon receiving a communication at a local-area network 235, furtherrouting may still need to be performed. Such intra-network routing canbe performed via an intra-network connection component 255, such as aswitch 280 or hub 285. Each intra-network connection component 255 canbe connected to (e.g., wirelessly or wired, such as via an Ethernetcable) multiple terminal devices 215. Hub 285 can be configured torepeat all received communications to each device to which it isconnected. Each terminal device can then evaluate each communication todetermine whether the terminal device is the destination device orwhether the communication is to be ignored. Switch 280 can be configuredto selectively direct communications to only the destination terminaldevice.

In some embodiments, a local-area network 235 can be divided intomultiple segments, each of which can be associated with independentfirewalls, security rules and network protocols. An intra-networkconnection component 255 can be provided in each of one, more or allsegments to facilitate intra-segment routing. A bridge 290 can beconfigured to route communications across segments 275.

To appropriately route communications across or within networks, variouscomponents analyze destination data in the communications. For example,such data can indicate which network a communication is to be routed to,which device within a network a communication is to be routed to orwhich communications a terminal device is to process (versus ignore).However, in some embodiments, it is not immediately apparent whichterminal device (or even which network) is to participate in acommunication from a network device.

To illustrate, a set of terminal devices may be configured so as toprovide similar types of responsive communications. Thus, it may beexpected that a query in a communication from a network device may beresponded to in similar manners regardless to which network device thecommunication is routed. While this assumption may be true at a highlevel, various details pertaining to terminal devices can give rise toparticular routings being advantageous as compared to others. Forexample, terminal devices in the set may differ from each other withrespect to (for example) which communication channels are supported,geographic and/or network proximity to a network device and/orcharacteristics of associated agents (e.g., knowledge bases, experience,languages spoken, availability, general personality or sentiment, etc.).Accordingly, select routings may facilitate faster responses that moreaccurately and/or completely respond to a network-device communication.A complication is that static routings mapping network devices toterminal devices may fail to account for variations in communicationtopics, channel types, agent availability, and so on.

FIGS. 3A, 3B, 3C show block diagrams of other embodiments of acommunication system 300 a, 300 b, 300 c that includes a connectionmanagement system 350, including example connection management systems350A and 350B. Each of the depicted systems 300 a, 300 b, 300 c showonly two local-area networks 235 for simplicity, though it can beappreciated that embodiments can be extended to expand the number oflocal-area networks. Each of systems 300 a, 300 b, 300 c include aconnection management system 150, which can identify which terminaldevice is to communicate with network device 205, can establish andmanage (e.g., maintain or close) connections, can determine whether andwhen to re-route communications in an exchange, and so on. Thus,connection management system 150 can be configured to dynamically, andin real-time, evaluate communications, agent availability, capabilitiesof terminal devices or agents, and so on, to influence routingdeterminations.

In FIG. 3A, connection management system 150 is associated with each ofnetwork device 205 and a remote server 340 (e.g., connection managementsystem 150 a is associated with network device 205 and connectionmanagement system 150 b is associated with remote server 340). Forexample, connection management system 150 a and/or connection managementsystem 150 b can be installed or stored as an application on each ofnetwork device 205 and remote server 340, respectively. Execution of theapplication(s) can facilitate, for example, a communication betweennetwork device 205 and remote server 340 to identify a terminal device215 selected to participate in a communication exchange with networkdevice 205. The identification can be made based on one or more factorsdisclosed herein (e.g., availability, matching between a communication'stopic/level of detail with agents' or terminal devices' knowledge bases,predicted latency, channel-type availability, and so on).

A client device 330 can provide client data indicating how routingdeterminations are to be made. For example, such data can include:indications as to how particular characteristics are to be weighted ormatched or constraints or biases (e.g., pertaining to load balancing orpredicted response latency). Client data can also include specificationsrelated to when communication channels are to be established (or closed)or when communications are to be re-routed to a different networkdevice. Client data can be used to define various client-specific rules,such as rules for communication routing and so on.

Connection management system 150 b executing on remote server 340 canmonitor various metrics pertaining to terminal devices (e.g., pertainingto a given client), such as which communication channels are supported,geographic and/or network proximity to a network device, communicationlatency and/or stability with the terminal device, a type of theterminal device, a capability of the terminal device, whether theterminal device (or agent) has communicated with a given network device(or user) before and/or characteristics of associated agents (e.g.,knowledge bases, experience, languages spoken, availability, generalpersonality or sentiment, etc.). Accordingly, communication managementsystem 150 b may be enabled to select routings to facilitate fasterresponses that more accurately and/or completely respond to anetwork-device communication based on the metrics.

In the example depicted in FIG. 3A, a communication exchange betweennetwork device 205 and remote server 340 can facilitate earlyidentification of a destination address. Network device 205 may then usethe destination address to direct subsequent communications. Forexample, network device 205 may send an initial communication to remoteserver 340 (e.g., via one or more inter-network connections and awide-area network), and remote server 340 may identify one or morecorresponding clients. Remote server 340 may then identify a set ofterminal devices associated with the one or more corresponding clientsand collect metrics for those terminal devices. The metrics can beevaluated (e.g., by remote server 340) so as to select a terminal deviceto involve in a communication exchange, and information pertaining tothe terminal device (e.g., an IP address) can be sent to network device205. In some embodiments, remote server 340 may continuously orperiodically collect and evaluate metrics for various terminal devicesand store evaluation results in a data store. In such embodiments, uponidentifying a set of terminal devices associated with the one or morecorresponding clients, remote server 340 can access the storedevaluation results from the data store and select a terminal device toinvolve in the communication exchange based on the stored evaluationresults.

In FIG. 3B, connection management system 150 can be configured to serveas a relay and/or destination address. Thus, for example, a set ofnetwork devices 205 may transmit communications, each identifyingconnection management system 150 as a destination. Connection managementsystem 150 can receive each communication and can concurrently monitor aset of terminal devices (e.g., so as to generate metrics for eachterminal device). Based on the monitoring and a rule, connectionmanagement system 150 can identify a terminal device 215 to which it mayrelay each communication. Depending on the embodiment, terminal devicecommunications may similarly be directed to a consistent destination(e.g., of connection management system 150) for further relaying, orterminal devices may begin communicating directly with correspondingnetwork devices. These embodiments can facilitate efficient routing andthorough communication monitoring.

The embodiment depicted in FIG. 3C is similar to that in FIG. 3B.However, in some embodiments, connection management system 150 isdirectly connected to intra-network components (e.g., terminal devices,intra-network connections, or other).

It will be appreciated that many variations of FIGS. 3A-3C arecontemplated. For example, connection management system 150 may beassociated with a connection component (e.g., inter-network connectioncomponent 245 or intra-network connection component 255) such that anapplication corresponding to connection management system 150 (or partthereof) is installed on the component. The application may, forexample, perform independently or by communicating with one or moresimilar or complementary applications (e.g., executing on one or moreother components, network devices or remotes servers).

FIG. 4 shows a representation of a protocol-stack mapping 400 ofconnection components' operation. More specifically, FIG. 4 identifies alayer of operation in an Open Systems Interaction (OSI) model thatcorresponds to various connection components.

The OSI model can include multiple logical layers 402-414. The layersare arranged in an ordered stack, such that layers 402-412 each serve ahigher level and layers 404-414 is each served by a lower layer. The OSImodel includes a physical layer 402. Physical layer 402 can defineparameters physical communication (e.g., electrical, optical, orelectromagnetic). Physical layer 402 also defines connection managementprotocols, such as protocols to establish and close connections.Physical layer 402 can further define a flow-control protocol and atransmission mode.

A link layer 404 can manage node-to-node communications. Link layer 404can detect and correct errors (e.g., transmission errors in the physicallayer 402) and manage access permissions. Link layer 404 can include amedia access control (MAC) layer and logical link control (LLC) layer.

A network layer 406 can coordinate transferring data (e.g., of variablelength) across nodes in a same network (e.g., as datagrams). Networklayer 406 can convert a logical network address to a physical machineaddress.

A transport layer 408 can manage transmission and receipt quality.Transport layer 408 can provide a protocol for transferring data, suchas a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). Transport layer 408 canperform segmentation/desegmentation of data packets for transmission andcan detect and account for transmission errors occurring in layers 402,404,406. A session layer 410 can initiate, maintain and terminateconnections between local and remote applications. Sessions may be usedas part of remote-procedure interactions. A presentation layer 412 canencrypt, decrypt and format data based on data types known to beaccepted by an application or network layer.

An application layer 414 can interact with software applications thatcontrol or manage communications. Via such applications, applicationlayer 414 can (for example) identify destinations, local resource statesor availability and/or communication content or formatting. Variouslayers 402, 404, 406, 408, 410, 412414 can perform other functions asavailable and applicable.

Intra-network connection components 422, 424 are shown to operate inphysical layer 402 and link layer 404. More specifically, a hub canoperate in the physical layer, such that operations can be controlledwith respect to receipts and transmissions of communications. Becausehubs lack the ability to address communications or filter data, theypossess little to no capability to operate in higher levels. Switches,meanwhile, can operate in link layer 404, as they are capable offiltering communication frames based on addresses (e.g., MAC addresses).

Meanwhile, inter-network connection components 426, 428 are shown tooperate on higher levels (e.g., layers 406, 408, 410, 412, 414). Forexample, routers can filter communication data packets based onaddresses (e.g., IP addresses). Routers can forward packets toparticular ports based on the address, so as to direct the packets to anappropriate network. Gateways can operate at the network layer andabove, perform similar filtering and directing and further translationof data (e.g., across protocols or architectures).

A connection management system 450 can interact with and/or operate on,in various embodiments, one, more, all or any of the various layers. Forexample, connection management system 450 can interact with a hub so asto dynamically adjust which terminal devices the hub communicates. Asanother example, connection management system 450 can communicate with abridge, switch, router or gateway so as to influence which terminaldevice the component selects as a destination (e.g., MAC, logical orphysical) address. By way of further examples, a connection managementsystem 450 can monitor, control, or direct segmentation of data packetson transport layer 408, session duration on session layer 410, and/orencryption and/or compression on presentation layer 412. In someembodiments, connection management system 450 can interact with variouslayers by exchanging communications with (e.g., sending commands to)equipment operating on a particular layer (e.g., a switch operating onlink layer 404), by routing or modifying existing communications (e.g.,between a network device and a terminal device) in a particular manner,and/or by generating new communications containing particularinformation (e.g., new destination addresses) based on the existingcommunication. Thus, connection management system 450 can influencecommunication routing and channel establishment (or maintenance ortermination) via interaction with a variety of devices and/or viainfluencing operating at a variety of protocol-stack layers.

FIG. 5A illustrates aspects of a communication system in accordance withsome aspects of the present technology. FIG. 5A illustrates operationsand communications between the user device 105, the connectionmanagement system 150, the client device 130, and the services cloud 180(as well as FaaS cloud 190 within services cloud 180). FIG. 5Aillustrates operations and communications for invoking and usingfunctions via a FaaS cloud in accordance with examples described hereinfor a single client device, and with the listed individual elements.Additional examples can be used to provide similar functionality for anynumber of client and user devices, using any structure or combination ofone or more connection management systems and service cloud structures.

The example of FIG. 5A shows connection management system 150 and clientdevice 130 exchanging communications 503 for operations 502 to configuretemplates and triggers. Connection management system 150 then exchangescommunications 513 as part of operations 512 to provision the FaaSsystem. Such operations and communications can include quality ofservice, available operations, structuring of templates and commands toaccess and update templates or functions in a system, or any other suchoperations described herein. After the FaaS provisioning operations 512are complete, services cloud 180 is configured to accept FaaS invocationcommunications (e.g. FaaS request operation 528) and provide functionoutputs, or perform any other such triggered action as part of a FaaSsystem described herein. FIG. 5A describes client device 130implementing FaaS functions in services cloud 180 via connectionmanagement system 150. In other examples, client device 130 can interactdirectly with interfaces of services cloud 180 or FaaS cloud 190 toallow a client business to update function operations or any aspect of afunction that impacts the client's service through a communicationsystem, either directly, or through any intermediate steps (e.g., viaconnection management system 150 or other such intermediate systems).

Following completion of provisioning of the FaaS setup with servicescloud 180, user device 105 is involved in a two-way communicationmanaged by connection management system 150. The two-way communicationcan be with an agent system (e.g., terminal device 115) or any otherdevice managed by connection management system 150. The two-waycommunication begins with operations 522 to initiate the two-waycommunication, beginning with communication(s) 523. The two-waycommunication can be initiated by user device 105, for example, when auser selects a two-way communication interface in a sales website for amerchant (e.g., a merchant associated with client device 130). Thetwo-way communication can also be initiated by connection managementsystem 150, for example, by making an automated connection request usinga sales lead associated with the merchant managing client device 130.

The two-way communication system then proceeds if the initiating partyand the target party both agree to a two-way communication session, withoperations 524 and 526 of the communication session and associatedcommunications 527. At some point during communication sessionoperations 526, operation 528 identifies a trigger in operation 528. Thetrigger can be identified at user device 105 or at connection managementsystem 150. The trigger is a trigger that was configured and provisionedfor in the services cloud 180 in operations 502 and 512. Once thetrigger is identified, the associated function is invoked using FaaSrequest operations 530, which include communication of a request incommunication 531. The FaaS cloud within services cloud 180 receives therequest and executes the associated function in operations 532. Asdescribed herein, the executed function can either be sent with therequest as part of communication 531, or can be previously structuredwith an identifier in services cloud 180, with communication 531identifying the previously provided function.

Regardless of how the details of the function are provided, a functionoutput is generated from the services cloud 180 in operations 534. Thefunction output data from operations 534 is sent to connectionmanagement system 150 in communications 535, and managed as FaaS outputdata in operations 536. Such information can include details about aresponse associated with the trigger, automated tool data, or any othersuch information configured for a two-way communication and associatedwith a given trigger. The data received in operations 536 are integratedinto the two-way communication session in operations 538 withcommunications 541, and used to facilitate aspects of the communicationsession. The facilitation can include providing information, providingmachine interface tools, assisting with transferring one side of thetwo-way communication to a more appropriate counterparty (e.g., adifferent client or a different customized bot for a client), or anyother such facilitation described herein to improve user experiences andinterfaces with a communication system. The trigger and output dataresponse can be repeated any number of times within a two-waycommunication. Additionally, a communication system can include manytwo-way communications between large numbers of user devices andterminals (e.g., between users and agents), with each session usingtriggers customized for different client (e.g., merchant serviceprovider) systems with different sets of triggers.

FIG. 5B illustrates aspects of a communication system in accordance withsome aspects of the present technology. FIG. 5B shows an additionalexample of operations for the same system as in FIG. 5A, where the FaaSservices has previously been configured (e.g., by client device 130),and where terminal device 115 is shown as involved in an invocation andassociated facilitation of a two-way communication with user device 105using a two-way communication system that includes connection managementsystem 150 and services cloud 180 (as well as FaaS cloud 190).

FIG. 5B shows a two-way communication between user device 105 andterminal device 115 managed by connection management system. The two-waycommunication session begins with operations 552 and communications 553which establish the communication session between the user device 105and terminal device 115. At the time of the session initiation, thetwo-way communication can also be associated with a custom set oftriggers and functions associated with a particular client, asprovisioned before the session begins. The particular set of triggerscan be identified when the session is initiated through a client (e.g.,merchant) website, or as part of a connection management system 150initiated sales lead for a particular client and with the client'sspecialized set of triggers.

Once the communication session is established and proceeds in operations554 via communications 557, the connection management system 150identifies details of the communication session in operation 556 thatare associated with a trigger. As described herein, the triggers can befrom text in the two-way communication session (e.g., as illustrated byFIG. 7 and the associated description below), or by other suchoperations of the system. For example, in some implementations, aconnection initiation associated with a particular merchant can triggerone or more functions before any communications between the user device105 and any terminal device 115 occurs. In the example of FIG. 5B, afunction is invoked with a FaaS request operation 558 sent incommunication 559. The services cloud 180 then begins executing afunction in operation 560 that can proceed to be executed in real-timewith the two-way communication session, with any number of additionalsets of data and function outputs sent in communications 559 and 561.The connection management system 150 receives outputs in operations 562and takes actions based on the outputs in operations 564, which canresult in communications 565 which facilitate the communication sessionas part of operations 566 and/or 554. For example, a trigger inoperation 556 can invoke a specialized assistance machine (e.g., bot)configured to perform natural language processing for a particularspecialized topic, and to provide responses to user inputs customizedfor a particular topic or merchant category. The bot can be executed inreal-time via services cloud 180, with cloud resources provisioned tothe bot for the specific two-way communication, until the two-waycommunication session is terminated in operations 570 and communications571 and 573. When the communication session is terminated, theconnection management system 150 performs operations 572 to signalservices cloud 180 in communication 573 to end execution of the functionin operations 572. In the bot example above, the resources provisionedto provide the real-time specialized natural language processing for acustomized topic will be terminated. The resources can then be returnedto a pool of cloud resources to be available for other operations.Future communication using the same bot will invoke a new instance ofthe bot function in the services cloud 180, with resources provided forthe new instance.

FIG. 6 shows a block diagram of an embodiment of a connection managementsystem 600. Connection management system 600 can, in some examples, beused as connection management system 150 or any other such connectionmanagement system. A message receiver interface 605 can receive amessage. In some embodiments, the message can be received, for example,as part of a communication transmitted by a source device (e.g., housedseparately from connection management system 150 or within a samehousing), such as a network device or endpoint. In some embodiments, thecommunication can be part of a series of communications or a communicateexchange, which can include a series of messages or communicationexchange being routed between two devices (e.g., a network device andendpoint). This message or communication exchange may be part of and/ormay define an interaction between the devices. A communication channelor operative channel can include one or more protocols (e.g., routingprotocols, task-assigning protocols and/or addressing protocols) used tofacilitate routing and a communication exchange between the devices.

In some embodiments, the message can include a message generated basedon inputs received at a user interface. For example, the message caninclude a message that was generated based on button or key presses orrecorded speech signals, or speech to text software. In one instance,the message includes an automatically generated message, such as onegenerated upon detecting that a network device is presenting aparticular app page or webpage or has provided a particular inputcommand (e.g., key sequence). The message can include an instruction orrequest, such as one to initiate a communication exchange.

In some embodiments, the message can be a natural languagecommunication, whether spoken or typed. A natural languagecommunication, as used herein, refers to ordinary use of a language usedto communicate amongst humans, and is contrasted with use of languagedefined by a protocol required for communicating with a specific virtualassistant or artificial intelligence tool. A natural languagecommunication should not require constraints such as the use of a wakeword to alert an artificial intelligence tool that a communication isaddressed to the artificial intelligence. Additionally, a naturallanguage communication should not require the user to identifyparticular key words, specific phrases, or explicitly name a service inorder to understand how to service the communication. In someembodiments, natural language may include emoticons and other forms ofmodern communication.

While the present technology utilizes natural language communications,the communications can identify particular key words, specific phrases,or explicitly name a service. For example, the message can include or beassociated with an identifier of a client. For example, the message canexplicitly identify the client (or a device associated with the client);the message can include or be associated with a webpage or appassociated with the client; the message can include or be associatedwith a destination address associated with a client; or the message caninclude or be associated with an identification of an item (e.g.,product) or service associated with the client (e.g., being offered forsale by the client, having been sold by the client or being one that theclient services). To illustrate, a network device may be presenting anapp page of a particular client, which may offer an option to transmit acommunication to an agent. Upon receiving user input corresponding to amessage, a communication may be generated to include the message and anidentifier of the particular client.

A processing engine 610 may process a received communication and/ormessage. Processing can include, for example, extracting one or moreparticular data elements (e.g., a message, a client identifier, anetwork-device identifier, an account identifier, and so on). Processingcan include transforming a formatting or communication type (e.g., to becompatible with a particular device type, operating system,communication-channel type, protocol and/or network).

Template selection engine 614 can be used by client devices or systemoperators to identify or modify trigger templates or function templatesto be used in a communication system. The processing engine 610 can workwith template selection engine to configure a system with templatesselected using template selection engine 614. The processing can includepushing selected templates to connection management systems, terminaldevices, or user devices for use when checking for function triggers aspart of a two-way communication session. The process can also includepushing functions to any such device, or if a function is stored in acloud system, the functions are pushed to the cloud and identifiers arepushed to the triggering devices (e.g., to allow a triggering devicesuch as a terminal device to identify a function to be used when aninvocation communication is sent to an FaaS cloud).

A trigger management engine 615 may assess the (e.g., extracted orreceived) message. This message can be accessed from a message datastore 620, which manages messages received by interface 605 and assessedby trigger management engine 615. The assessment can includeidentifying, for example, one or more triggers for the message. Examplesof triggers can include (for example) text indicating a particulartopic, sentiment, complexity, and urgency. A topic can include, but itnot limited to, a subject, a product, a service, a technical issue, ause question, a complaint, a refund request or a purchase request, etc.In some examples, a trigger can be determined, for example, based on asemantic analysis of a message (e.g., by identifying keywords, sentencestructures, repeated words, punctuation characters and/or non-articlewords); user input (e.g., having selected one or more categories);and/or message-associated statistics (e.g., typing speed and/or responselatency). Aspects of trigger management engine 615 can use machinelearning to generate and revise systems for associating incomingcommunications (e.g. text) from a user with an intent category. Forexample, machine learning models can use previous data and results ofassociations between words and phrases in incoming communications aswell as natural language data from current and historical communicationsto generate and update associations between words and intent categories.The learning can be done with any combination of supervised learningwith constructed data sets and historical data, unsupervised learningbased on expectation or projection models for current routing paths in asystem and system use targets. Any such data can be used in operationsfor natural language processing (e.g. natural language understanding,natural language inference, etc.) to generate natural language data orto update machine learning models. Such data can then be used by theclient systems or shared with applications running on a network deviceor on a server to improve dynamic message processing (e.g. improvedintent indicator data results or response message generation). In someexamples, convolutional neural networks can be used with sets ofincoming words and phrases along with output intent categories. Such aneural network can be trained with input words and phrases and outputcorrelations to intent categories. Real-time system operations can thenuse instances of such a neural network to generate data on associationsbetween incoming user communications and words in a user communicationand intent categories in a system. Based on the outputs of such a neuralnetwork, an intent category can be assigned to a user or user accountinvolved in a communication, and associated actions can be assigned. Insome implementations, the neural network settings can be modified withreal-time dynamic feedback from usage to shift associations betweenwords in user communications and intent categories and actions selectedbased on these words. These selections can be probabilistic, and so theAI and machine learning systems can automatically track shifts in userexpectations by integrating user feedback and usage data to improvesystem performance. For example, when a user is directed to an endpointaction for a particular intent category or subcategory, the user canprovide a feedback communication indicating that the user is looking fora different action. This can be used as real-time feedback in a systemto shift the probabilities and annotations associated with future intentcategory assignments.

In some embodiments, a trigger can invoke a function used to clarify auser intent by engaging user 110 in a conversation that can includeclarifying questions, or simply requesting additional information. Sucha function can have associated additional triggers specifically for theinvoked function and specialized based on associated details to match afunction with an intent of a two-way communication. Such examples, canthus include conditional triggers, such that an invoked function can beassociated with conditional triggers that are only active as part of afunction operation, and when the function terminates (e.g., by routing atwo-way communication), the associated triggers are no longer active.Just as above, various machine learning and AI systems can be used togenerate and update systems for responding to a user. For example, insome systems, each intent category and sub-category can have a differentassociated convolutional neural network. In some examples, an actiontaken in response to processing words from a user is to associate anintent category and a neural network for the intent category to acommunication with a user, and to process the user communications usingthe assigned neural network. As described herein, multiple differentneural networks can be used in the course of a conversation (e.g.multiple back and forth communications between a user and a system), anddata for such communications can be used in machine learning operationsto update the neural networks or other systems used for futureinteractions with users and operations to associate intent categoriesand actions with words from a user communication. Usage data by userscan be used to adjust weights in a neural network to improve intentcategory assignments and track changes in user intent trends (e.g. finaluser intent results identified at the end of a user conversation with asystem as compared with assigned intents based on initial usercommunications). Data generated by intent management engine 615 can bestored with associated message data in message data store 620, and thisdata can be used for various updates, including managing data forcontinuous real-time analysis updates or other dynamic feedback andmodifications to a system, as described herein.

An interaction management engine 625 can determine to which endpoint acommunication is to be routed and how the receiving and transmittingdevices are to communicate. Each of these determinations can depend, forexample, on whether a particular network device (or any network deviceassociated with a particular user) has previously communicated with anendpoint in a set of endpoints (e.g., any endpoint associated withconnection management system 150 or any endpoint associated with one ormore particular clients). In some examples, an interaction managementengine 625 is invoked as an action to route a user communication to adifferent endpoint based on intent, trigger, or function categoriesassigned to a user communication and used to associated particulartriggers with a sub-portion of a two-way communication session (e.g.,where some triggers apply to parts of a session but not other parts).Such examples can involve updates to an endpoint (e.g. a particularagent or AI bot resource) being used during a conversation with a user,with triggers only associated with a session until an endpoint isachieved.

In some embodiments, when a network device (or other network deviceassociated with a same user or account) has previously communicated witha given endpoint (e.g., communications with a particular agent or AIsystem about matters relating to a particular topic or system client orbusiness), communication routing can be generally biased towards thesame endpoint. Other factors that may influence routing can include, forexample, an inferred or identified user or agent sentiment pertaining tothe previous communication; a topic of a present communication (e.g.,and an extent to which that relates to a topic of a previouscommunication and/or a knowledge base associated with one or moreendpoints); whether the endpoint is available; and/or a predictedresponse latency of the endpoint. Such factors may be consideredabsolutely or relative to similar metrics corresponding to otherendpoints. A re-routing rule (e.g., a client-specific or general rule)can indicate how such factors are to be assessed and weighted todetermine whether to forego agent consistency. Just as above for intentcategory assignment, AI analysis can be used to determine re-routingrules in a system. For example, when history data processed by machinelearning systems identify no correlation between certain types of usercommunications and certain re-routing operations, such re-routingoperations can be discontinued. By contrast, when such machine learninganalysis identifies positive results correlated with re-routing rules,such rules can be emphasized or strengthen, to prioritize re-routing(e.g. dedicating additional systems to re-routing, prioritizingre-routing options in agent assignments, etc.) In some examples, atrigger can be flagged or identified as associated with successfulendpoint routing by machine learning systems as described above.

With regard to determining how devices are to communicate, interactionmanagement engine 625 can (for example) determine whether an endpoint isto respond to a communication via (for example) email, online chat, SMSmessage, voice call, video chat, etc. A communication type can beselected based on, for example, a communication-type priority list(e.g., at least partly defined by a client or user); a type of acommunication previously received from the network device (e.g., so asto promote consistency), a complexity of a received message,capabilities of the network device, and/or an availability of one ormore endpoints. Appreciably, some communication types will result inreal-time communication (e.g., where fast message response is expected),while others can result in asynchronous communication (e.g., wheredelays (e.g., of several minutes or hours) between messages areacceptable).

In some embodiments, the communication type can be a text messaging orchat application. These communication technologies provide the benefitthat no new software needs to be downloaded and executed on users'network devices. In some examples, the communication type can be a voicecommunication type. In such examples, voice to text systems can be usedto process voice communications into words to be analyzed by examplesystems described herein. In some examples, words analyzed by a systemcan include words represented by audio data. Thus, as described herein,words can be represented by combinations of symbols stored in memory(e.g. American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) data)or can be represented by audio data (e.g. data representing soundcombinations)

Interaction management engine 625 can interact with an account engine630 in various contexts. For example, account engine 630 may look up anidentifier of a network device or endpoint in an account data store 635to identify an account corresponding to the device. Further, accountengine 630 can maintain data about previous communication exchanges(e.g., times, involved other device(s), channel type, resolution stage,topic(s) and/or associated client identifier), communication channels(e.g., indicating—for each of one or more clients—whether any channelsexist, an endpoint associated with each channel, an establishment time,a usage frequency, a date of last use, any channel constraints and/orsupported types of communication), user or agent preferences orconstraints (e.g., related to terminal-device selection, responselatency, terminal-device consistency, agent expertise, and/orcommunication-type preference or constraint), and/or user or agentcharacteristics (e.g., age, language(s) spoken or preferred,geographical location, interests, and so on).

Further, interaction management engine 625 can alert account engine 630of various connection-channel actions, such that account data store 635can be updated to reflect the current channel data. For example, uponestablishing a channel, interaction management engine 625 can notifyaccount engine 630 of the establishment and identify one or more of: anetwork device, an endpoint, an account and a client. Account engine 630can subsequently notify a user of the channel's existence such that theuser can be aware of the agent consistency being availed.

Interaction management engine 625 can further interact with a clientmapping engine 640, which can map a communication to one or more clients(and/or associated brands). In some embodiments, a communicationreceived from a network device itself includes an identifiercorresponding to a client (e.g., an identifier of a client, product,service, webpage, or app page). The identifier can be included as partof a message (e.g., which client mapping engine 640 may detect) orincluded as other data in a message-inclusive communication. Clientmapping engine 640 may then look up the identifier in a client datastore 645 to retrieve additional data about the client and/or anidentifier of the client.

In some embodiments, a message may not particularly correspond to anyclient. For example, a message may include a general query. Clientmapping engine 640 may, for example, perform a semantic analysis on themessage, identify one or more keywords and identify one or more clientsassociated with the keyword(s). In some embodiments, a single client isidentified. In some embodiments, multiple clients are identified. Anidentification of each client may then be presented via a network devicesuch that a user can select a client to communicate with (e.g., via anassociated endpoint).

Client data store 645 can include identifications of one or moreendpoints (and/or agents) associated with the client. A terminal routingengine 650 can retrieve or collect data pertaining to each of one, moreor all such endpoints (and/or agents) so as to influence routingdeterminations. For example, terminal routing engine 650 may maintain anendpoint data store 655, which can store information such as endpoints'device types, operating system, communication-type capabilities,installed applications accessories, geographic location and/oridentifiers (e.g., IP addresses). Information can also include agentinformation, such as experience level, position, skill level, knowledgebases (e.g., topics that the agent is knowledgeable about and/or a levelof knowledge for various topics), personality metrics, working hours,language(s) spoken and/or demographic information. Some information canbe dynamically updated. For example, information indicating whether anendpoint is available may be dynamically updated based on (for example)a communication from an endpoint (e.g., identifying whether the deviceis asleep, being turned off/on, idle/active, or identifying whetherinput has been received within a time period); a communication routing(e.g., indicative of whether an endpoint is involved in or beingassigned to be part of a communication exchange); or a communicationfrom a network device or endpoint indicating that a communicationexchange has ended or begun.

It will be appreciated that, in various contexts, being engaged in oneor more communication exchanges does not necessarily indicate that anendpoint is not available to engage in another communication exchange.Various factors, such as communication types (e.g., text, message,email, chat, phone), client-identified or user-identified targetresponse times, and/or system loads (e.g., generally or with respect toa user) may influence how many exchanges an endpoint may be involved in.

When interaction management engine 625 has identified an endpoint toinvolve in a communication exchange or connection, it can notifyterminal routing engine 650, which may retrieve any pertinent data aboutthe endpoint from endpoint data store 655, such as a destination (e.g.,IP) address, device type, protocol, etc. Processing engine 610 can thenmodify the message-inclusive communication or generate a newcommunication (including the message) so as to have a particular format,comply with a particular protocol, and so on. In some embodiments, a newor modified message may include additional data, such as account datacorresponding to a network device, a message chronicle, and/or clientdata.

A message transmitter interface 660 can then transmit the communicationto the endpoint. The transmission may include, for example, a wired orwireless transmission to a device housed in a separate housing. Theendpoint can include an endpoint in a same or different network (e.g.,local-area network) as connection management system 150. Accordingly,transmitting the communication to the endpoint can include transmittingthe communication to an inter- or intra-network connection component.

FIG. 7 illustrates aspects of a conversation deploying FaaS bot 702template in accordance with some aspects of the present technology. TheFaaS system can invoke FaaS functions from standard messaging events.For example, a new conversation start event can be chosen as a triggerto invoke a function. FIG. 7 shows a communication including header 710,text 712, FaaS trigger 714, and text 716. The FaaS trigger 714 can be aspecific set of text as part of the communication that is matched to atrigger template. When a communication is received, a set of triggertemplates is compared with the text to identify FaaS trigger 714. Asdescribed above, the set of trigger templates can include triggers forall clients of the system, or can be customized by a client. In someexamples, client devices can access a system to update the set oftemplates or to modify or alter individual templates dynamically inreal-time as the system is operating. As the updates are occurring,existing function executions in a services cloud (e.g., operations 560in cloud 180) can continue running an old function, while newinvocations in the services cloud will use the updated function once theupdates are complete. If a function trigger invokes a communication thatis sent to the services cloud (e.g., with code to execute the function),the update to the user device or terminal device that invokes thefunction will similarly allow such dynamic real-time updates to a systemat the user devices and terminal devices.

The example of FIG. 7 describes identifying a trigger from message text,but any other such trigger can be used, including details of header 710,or any other such identifiable element of a communication in a system asdescribed herein.

When FaaS trigger 714 is identified as described above, the device thatidentifies FaaS trigger 714 invokes the corresponding function byinitiating communication 720 for function access 722. Along with theinvocation, the function can be sent to the FaaS system in communication720 with a payload including metadata related to the new conversation.In other examples, the function or a function template can bepre-configured in the FaaS system (e.g., FaaS cloud 190), and simplyidentified by the invocation communication initiated by the trigger. Inany such example, the payload can then be used in the function asexecuted by the FaaS system (e.g., FaaS cloud 190) in function executionas well as in any further processing and referencing. The FaaS systemmay support various programming languages such as JavaScript, Python,Structured Query Language, PHP, Ruby, C, C++, C Sharp, Visual Basic,Java, Objective-C, Perl, or any other programming language suitable forthe intended purpose and understood by a person of ordinary skill in theart. Results or outputs of the function are returned in communication724, and can be used to facilitate or influence text 716, to generatenew text or data to be communicated as part of a two-way communicationsession, or to take any other action to facilitate improved operation ofthe communication system.

The FaaS system can execute custom functions with custom logic inresponse to events in the FaaS platform. Events occur all the time andcan include events such as “Conversation Started,” “Conversation SurveySubmitted,” “An agent logging in/out of a platform,” and any other eventthat can induce a trigger suitable for the intended purpose andunderstood by a person of ordinary skill in the art. These events can beconfigurable to be customized that define custom logic. Developers canfurther prepare and write simple and complicated functions to furtherdevelopment the conversational experience. With the click of a button, acloud-based platform can be deployed such as LivePerson Cloud or othercloud services. The FaaS system also can support server provisioning,security, deployment, and scaling to support developers and companies inthe implementation of the code templates for a better conversionalexperience.

The FaaS system can include various elements in the implementation ofthe components that make up the system. For example, an “event gateway”can allow platform events to serve as triggers to invoke functions whensomething interesting occurs in a messaging conversation (e.g., theconversation becomes idle, participants join/leave, etc.). The eventgateway can allow external developers to connect and extend the FaaSplatform more easily with additional code.

The FaaS environment can enable users and developers the ability tocombine event triggers and coding templates in a contact center contextwhile being in a conversational commerce environment. The FaaS platformcan offer event types that are geared towards a contact center industry.For example, the “Messaging Line in Off-Hours” can be triggered when aconsumer writes a message in a conversation that started during workinghours, but in the meantime the contact center has switched to off-hours.On the FaaS platform, a JavaScript function can be triggered in responseto the above-referenced event. Other serverless providers fail toprovide this kind of response to similar events. The FaaS platform canprovide various templates to respond to any given number of events thatare specific to the contact center industry.

The FaaS system and method described herein does not only providecontact center specific events for its serverless environment, the FaaSsystem also can provide working code templates for events with anyindustry suitable for the intended purpose and understood by a person ofordinary skill in the art. If a function developer selects the“Messaging Line in Off-Hours” event, the FaaS platform can provide aready-to-go code template that is configurable upon receipt. Such anexample enables the function developer to leverage existinginfrastructure, improving the operation of an associated computingdevice by reducing the time taken to generate a template. Improveddevice functionality is also created such that the function developersalso can customize the template to meet their needs and provideadditional responses to an event.

One example of a trigger event with two possible (mutually exclusive)pieces of associated metadata are a trigger 1. Messaging ConversationEnd with metadata A. Agent closed the conversation or B. Consumer closedthe conversation. Another example of a trigger event with two (notmutually exclusive) pieces of associated metadata are trigger 2.Messaging Conversation Idle with metadata options A. Agent unresponsiveand/or B. Consumer unresponsive. As described above, the trigger can beidentified as part of a two-way conversation or by system event in aconnection management system or any other portion of a system, and usedto invoke a function at a FaaS system. The communication to the FaaSsystem can either identify a function previously configured in the FaaSsystem, or can include a function to be executed by serverless resourcesof a services cloud configured for FaaS operations. The communicationcan additionally include the metadata (e.g., indicating a conversationend event was triggered by a consumer closing a two-way communication)which can be used by the FaaS system. In other examples, the additionalinformation above is part of a template to identify separate but relatedtriggers, such that 1. A. above would be a different trigger with adifferent associated function for an agent closing a conversation thanthe trigger for 1. B. when the consumer closes a conversation. In suchan example, the function identified by or included in the invocationcommunication would be different for the different triggers. Theseparate trigger (e.g., two-trigger) example is in contrast to the priorexample, where a single trigger (e.g., message conversation ends) hasdifferent metadata options. An additional non-exhaustive list of triggerexamples includes triggers: 3. Messaging Conversation Routing; 4.Messaging Line in Off-Hours; 5. Messaging New Conversation; 6. MessagingParticipants Change; 7. Messaging Time-to-Respond (TTR); and 8. ChatPost Survey Email Transcript (CSAT Rules).

Each of the above triggers, or any other such triggers, can have anynumber of associated pieces of metadata identifying associatedinformation or associated functions to be used in response to thetrigger. Further examples can include different variations on suchtriggers. For example, trigger 6 (e.g., participants change) canidentify different categories of participants, with different triggersbased on the combinations of new and old participants and the associatedparticipant categories.

In some examples, a system can be configured with messaging-events forFunction Invocation (e.g., triggers based on a messaging event withoutassociated two-way communication data, or other such messaging events).In some such examples, the FaaS platform can override certainmessaging-events. The following “Conversation State Change Events” areexamples that can be used to trigger functions to execute:

9. New Conversation

A. This event can be executed if a consumer creates a new conversation;

10. TTR changed

A. The consumer can trigger an event by marking the conversation asurgent or vice versa;

B. The agent can trigger the event by changing the TTR;

11. Participants Change

A. This event can be executed if someone joins or leaves theconversation;

12. Conversation Idle

A. This event can be executed if a consumer or agent is not answering inthe configured idle-timeout;

13. Conversation Routing

A. This event can be executed if the conversation is routed to adifferent skill;

14. Messaging Line in Off-Hours

A. This event can be executed if a conversation was opened inoffice-hours and a new consumer line in conversation is written inoff-hours (e.g., off-hour message);

15. Conversation End

A. This event can be executed after a conversation is closed

By overriding these events, the deployed function can be called andprocessed by the function. If no system message is set in the result ofthe function, a default automatic message can be triggered.

The FaaS platform can have the option to execute callback commands to aninvoker. For conversational event invocation, the service that invokesthe functions can be a controller bot. This service also can beresponsible for sending system messages into the conversation. With thecontroller bot as the invoker, the FaaS platform can execute thefollowing callback commands with the controller bot:

16. Send a System-Message

17. Transfer Conversation to a different Skill

18. Close the Conversation

The FaaS platform also can have the option to not perform a callbackcommand. This can be relevant if a user or developer desires only to usethe invocation capability of the controller bot in order to triggerfunctions.

The FaaS platform can further add multiple commands to the response. Theresult can be an array or a single object. If more than one command pertype (e.g., 2 System-Messages) is added, only the first command of thistype may be processed.

An example of the callback can include:

let result = [{type: “systemMessage”, // Returns a system message intothe conversation text: “your message”}, {type: “transfer”, // Transfersthe conversation to a new skill skillId: “123456” },{type:“closeConversation” // Closes the conversation}] callback(null, result)

As described above, FaaS-Messaging, such as communications of FIGS. 5Aand 5B with services cloud (and associated FaaS cloud 190) can include apayload. For example, a Payload can be included in each Messaging “XXX”template function. With the FaaS platform (e.g., FaaS cloud 190), userscan implement custom feature requests faster and roll out the templatesat an expedited timetable, thereby increasing productivity. In addition,the FaaS platform can empower brand developers to use FaaS to implementtheir own feature requests. This is attractive for small and mediumsized customers/brands that do not have dedicated professional services.

The FaaS platform can enable companies to have their own engineers onthe platform and develop custom features, which can be triggered inresponse to certain events in the FaaS platform. Extensions can furtherbe written by third party companies and deployed with the click of abutton into the LivePerson Cloud.

FIG. 8 illustrates an example of properties and configurations of thefunctions, in accordance with some examples. FIG. 8 illustrates afunction template 800. The FaaS platform (e.g., FaaS cloud 190 inservice cloud 180) can offer a distinct set of function templates andhigher level event types that can be less geared towards a conversationlifecycle. Function template 800 is one example of a function templatethat can be used as part of a set of function templates. Other examplesof function templates can include other structures. The example functiontemplate 800 of FIG. 8 includes a header 810, a function name 820, alocation 830, control settings 840, and triggers 850.

Header 810 can be used to organize function templates. For example, theillustrated Runtime/Functions/Manage of header 810 can be a nestedstructure for organizing sets of function templates, with functiontemplate 800 one of many function templates in a set. In other examples,other such organizing structures can be used.

Name 820 can be used to identify a specific function template. In theexample of FIG. 8, “Hello SMS” is an identifying name for functiontemplate 800. Similarly, location 830 can be identifying pathinformation for data or code for implementing the function associatedwith function template. For example, the illustrated secure hypertexttransfer protocol (HTTPS) of location 830 can be associated with storagespace used for the instructions of function template 800. In someexamples, where the code is stored in a FaaS cloud, the location 830 canbe a location within the FaaS cloud. In other examples, the location 830can be any other storage location that can be accessed and used to sendthe code for the function to the FaaS cloud. Control settings 840 andtriggers 850 are configuration settings for use of the function template800 in a communication system. Control settings 840 can be used tomanage security or operational controls for use of function template800. Trigger(s) 850 can identify any triggers to be used when functiontemplate 800 is implemented as part of a communication system. Forexample, function template 800 can have multiple triggers, including atrigger for an incoming voice call and a separate trigger for anincoming text message. As described above, when function template 800 isused in a system (e.g., in a user device 105, CMS 150, or client device130), or actions and communications can be processed and compared withtriggers. When a trigger is matched to an action or communication, thefunction is invoked in a FaaS cloud (e.g., using location 830), eitherby invoking code in the FaaS cloud, or by accessing and sending the codefor the function to the FaaS cloud to be executed at the FaaS cloud.

FIG. 9 illustrates an example of a controller bot 900, in accordancewith some examples. As detailed above, in some examples, functiontemplates such as function template 800 can be used in a FaaS system toallow both real-time addition and modification of functions to thesystem, as well as allowing addition and modification of functions byboth internal system sources and independent third party sources. Forexample, in some implementations, a client (e.g., a merchant system) canadd functions to a system for communications associated with the clientduring real-time operation without shutting down the system for updates.Such functions can be added to a system through the use of a“controller-bot” to take a function template and implement the functiontemplate in a communication system to manage the triggers that willinvoke the associated function from the FaaS cloud. An example of theFaaS system and method can include an implementation as described below:

1. Setup Controller-Bot

If a Controller-Bot is set up, a user can go directly to “Enable FaaS”

1.1. Elevate LPA (LPAdmin Access) A. Click on Server Commands

B. Scroll to LPAdmin Access, choose the right server in the secondcolumn where the account can be runningC. Enter an account-number after site=in the third column (e.g.,site=1e63413568)D. Follow the displayed steps

1.2. Enable Controller-Bot

A. This step can be performed after step 1.1 because of the elevated LPA

B. Choose Controller Bot in the Navigation C. Click on ENABLE ON ACCOUNT

D. Choose tab Configuration->CONFIGURATION CHECK and click ENABLE ALLOnce the controller bot is enabled in the system, new actions in thesystem will be analyzed by the controller bot to check for triggers froman associated function template implemented by the controller bot. Whenthe trigger is identified, the function path (e.g., location 830) isused to facilitate execution of code for the function in a FaaS cloud(e.g., FaaS cloud 190) portion of a services cloud (e.g., services cloud180.

FIG. 10 illustrates an example of a user interface 1000 for creating anew function, in accordance with some examples. A new function can becreated by the FaaS platform user interface by using “Messaging xxx”templates. The FaaS platform user can either be a system administratorfor the communication system (e.g., associated with CMS 150), or aclient or merchant of the communication system. One or more functionsper template-type can be generated. If there are multiple types offunctionality that stem from the same event invocation, thesefunctionalities can be coded into the same lambda. Once the new functionis generated and stored, the core information for an associatedtemplate, including an associated header (e.g., header 810), a name(e.g., name 820, and a storage location (e.g., location 830) areavailable for the function to be included in a function template. Insome examples, the same function can be used in multiple differentfunction templates, with the different function templates havingdifferent control settings and/or different triggers.

FIG. 11 illustrates an example of a user interface 1100 for editing orcreating a function, such as the new function of FIG. 10, in accordancewith some examples. Function implementation can include adjusting thecoding from the template according to requirements by modifying thefunction. User interface allows searching of functions from theavailable functions stored in a system. For example, functions can besearched by the organization structure in a header, by name, by triggersor control settings in existing function templates, or by any other suchuse. In some examples, a system can store use information in a database,both for use in machine learning, as well as for searching as part offunction editing. For example, a communication system can store thefrequency with which a function is called, either in absolute terms(e.g., calls per day) or as a percentage of communications in a systemover a given period (e.g., 50% of communications associated withmerchant A have called function XYZ in the past month). Such functionusage data can be used to search and sort available functions, as wellas to provide machine learning or AI feedback as described herein.

FIG. 12 illustrates an example user interface 1200 of a conversation, inaccordance with some examples. On the left side, data 1210 associatedwith a conversation is illustrated. On the right side, an example ofpayload data 1220 is illustrated (e.g., a sidebar shows the payload).The payload data can include information about the conversation, or anyother such information. The result can be a single command or an arrayof commands. In the template code, the current available commands areshown.

FIG. 13 illustrates an example user interface 1300 for deploying andremoving a function, in accordance with some examples. An example ofdeploy function is illustrated and can deploy a new function with theFaaS platform by clicking MORE and Deploy functions. After successfuldeployment of the function, the deployed function can be called by theController-Bot in the corresponding event.

The disclosed single entry dual functionality system can be performedusing a computing system. An example computing system can include aprocessor (e.g., a central processing unit), memory, non-volatilememory, and an interface device. The memory may store data and/or andone or more code sets, software, scripts, etc. The components of thecomputer system can be coupled together via a bus or through some otherknown or convenient device. The processor may be configured to carry outall or part of methods described herein for example by executing codefor example stored in memory. One or more of a user device or computer,a provider server or system, or a suspended database update system mayinclude the components of the computing system or variations on such asystem.

The above described user interfaces improve the operation of a computingdevice in a two-way communication system by enabling efficient dynamicdeployment of functions as described herein within the communicationsystem. Such a communication system can be structured to managethousands of types of communications for many different clients, eachwith different communication goals and functions. By integrating,creation, search, editing, and deployment controls in the describedinterfaces, efficient management of bots, triggers, and functions insuch a communication system is enabled, along with the use of the FaaScloud to limit local resources and use on-demanding computing resourcesfor complex environments with many (e.g., tens, hundreds, thousands, ormore) functions with associated triggers operating in a communicationsystem.

In some examples, such user interfaces can be embodied in a computingdevice comprising a display screen, the computing device beingconfigured to display on the screen an interface in accordance with theexamples above. Such user interfaces can include a display on the screenof a summary of data associated with a function, function template, botcontroller, or any such aspect of the examples described above. Thesummary of data can be used to directly access instructions for afunction to allow modification of the function for dynamic and real-timeupdates to a communication system. Such user interfaces can additionallyinclude data for generating a function, template, bot controller, orother such element associated with a function, and for causing thecommunication system to be dynamically updated to use the function.Additionally, any other such interface described above can beimplemented as part of such an embodiment.

FIG. 14 shows a flowchart of a method embodiment in accordance with someaspects of the present technology. The described method describes anembodiment of analyzing an intent. In some examples, method 1400 isperformed by a computing device. In some examples, method 1400 isembodied as instructions that, when executed by one or more processorsof a device, cause the device to perform the operations of method 1400.

Method 1400 includes step 1402 for accessing a template configured toexecute a response based on an event. As described above, the templatecan be a template similar to function template 800 with a functionidentified by a location (e.g., location 830) and any other associateddata that can be used by the system. In some examples, the accessing isused to initiate a controller bot that is implemented by a device toanalyze data or actions in a communication system to match triggers ofthe function template to occurrences within the communication system.

Method 1400 includes step 1404 for facilitating a two-way communicationsession with a user device. Such a two-way communication session mayoccur when a user initiates a communication with an intent associatedwith a merchant or other communication system client. Such an intent maybe to make a purchase, identify information, schedule an appointment,receive technical support, or any other such intent. The two-waycommunication can include text communications, audio communications, anyother type of communication, or any combination of any suchcommunications.

Method 1400 includes step 1406 for processing data of the two-waycommunication session to identify an event trigger corresponding to thetemplate. For example, as described above, a controller bot or othermechanism within a communication can analyze events within a system(e.g., elements of a communication or actions supporting thecommunication in the system) for the trigger associated with thetemplate of step 1402.

Method 1400 includes step 1408 requesting execution of a serverlesscloud-based function associated with the event trigger. Such aserverless cloud-based function can involve execution of instructionsfor a function previously stored in a FaaS cloud, or sent to an FaaScloud with the request. The FaaS cloud executes the instructions andgenerates one or more outputs that can be used to enhance the two-waycommunication session.

Method 1400 includes step 1410 for integrating one or more outputs ofthe serverless cloud-based function associated with the event triggerinto the two-way communication session. The enhancement based on theoutputs from the FaaS cloud can include improving the substance of acommunication, improving operation of the communication system,identifying a new agent or node to be included in the communication,generating data to be used in the communication or data describing thecommunication (e.g., for later analysis or machine learning), or for anyother such purpose. The method 1400 allows many functions or complexfunctions to be used by leveraging serverless cloud-based resources toimprove communication system operations efficiently. By contrast, aserver based system either limits the available functions to preventover commitment of resources to the communication system, or isinefficient in the use of resources to provide equivalent functions towhat can be achieved by the described serverless cloud-based structure.

Some such examples can further operate by terminating execution of theserverless cloud-based function based on a termination of the two-waycommunication session. Similarly, some examples can further operate byprocessing data of the two-way communication session to identify afunction termination trigger corresponding to the serverless cloud-basedfunction and terminating the serverless cloud-based function based onthe function termination trigger. Just as the serverless cloud-basedsystem provides enhanced function availability as described above,system inefficiency is avoided by terminating function execution whenthe function is not needed, allowing cloud-based resources to bereallocated to other functions or other uses.

In some examples, method 1400 can operate where requesting theserverless cloud-based function includes transmitting code associatedwith the serverless cloud-based function, wherein when the code isreceived at a serverless provider, the serverless provider executes thecode to generate the one or more outputs of the serverless cloud-basedfunction. In other examples, requesting the serverless cloud-basedfunction associated with the event trigger further comprisestransmitting a request, wherein when the request is received at afunction-as-a-service platform, the function-as-a-service platformgenerates the one or more outputs. In further examples, other actionscan be taken in response to such a request.

In some examples of method 1400, the template includes contact centerdata for a contact center associated with the two-way communicationsession and a terminal device associated with an agent.

In other examples, method 1400 further comprises receiving configurationsettings associated with a client system, the configuration settingsselecting one or more templates including the template and one or moreevent triggers corresponding to the one or more templates andautomatically associating the one or more templates with two-waycommunication sessions associated with the client system.

Any such examples can further comprise facilitating connection of theuser device to a terminal device associated with an agent, where theevent trigger is communication data indicating a switch from anautomated agent to a human agent, and wherein the one or more outputsindicate the agent and the terminal device. Any such example above canfurther include repeated steps or intermediate steps. Method 1400therefore describes one example along with variations specificallyincluded above, but other methods are also contemplated in accordancewith the various examples and descriptions included herein.

Further, in various implementations, the above systems can be integratedwith AI and machine learning elements. Such elements can be dynamicallyand continuously updated in real-time (e.g. as processed given resourcelimits) to provide improvements in system performance and system use.Such examples improve the operations of a communication system byproviding information on the performance of the system and allowingerrors or improvements in the system to be identified. Such elementsadditional improve the operations of a communication system byfacilitating updates for added functionality and actions in response toidentifying function use in a FaaS system and dynamically selectingfunction templates and resource allocations based on patterns identifiedby AI or machine learning systems. Further, the AI and machine learningsystems above provide improvements to the performance of the devicesbeyond the described improvements solely from FaaS system operation.Such further improvements include increased responsive performance andreduction of processing resources that are wasted functions areinefficiently called or serverless cloud resources for the FaaS systemare allocated inefficiently. The described improvements in dynamicallocation for function resources as well as in function selectionimproves the efficiency of the involved computing devices, saving powerand system resources while providing communication and processingutility to users on behalf of system clients.

While various steps are described above, it will be apparent thatcertain steps can be repeated, and intervening steps can be performed aswell. Additionally, different devices in a system will performcorresponding steps, and various devices can be performing multiplesteps simultaneously. For example, a device can perform such steps toroute requests to multiple agents simultaneously, with devices ofmultiple different agents performing corresponding operations, and theagent devices communicating with user devices.

FIG. 15 shows a block diagram representing network environment 1500 forfunction selection (e.g., associations between triggers and functions ina FaaS cloud system) using machine-learning techniques. Networkenvironment 1500 may include network device 1505 (operated by a user)communication server 1510, FaaS cloud 1515 (e.g., such as FaaS cloud 190in services cloud 180) and terminal device 1520. Communication server1510 can facilitate the use of at least one function from FaaS 1515 in atwo way communication between network device 1505 and terminal device1520.

Communication server 1510 may include intelligent selection system 1525,message recommendation system 1530, and message data store 1535. Each ofintelligent selection system 1525 and message recommendation system 1530may include one or more computing devices with a processor and a memorythat execute instructions to implement certain operations. In someimplementations, intelligent selection system 1525 may be a botconfigured to manage repeated feedback data from functions selectedduring two way communications. The feedback can be used to determinewhether the selected and used function(s) in previous two waycommunications were the best functions for a given trigger, or if adifferent selected function for a given trigger can provided improvedresults. As part of such feedback operations, the triggers in a systemdescribed above can be dynamically updated, such that the function for agiven trigger at any time is based on the feedback results up to thattime, and the function selected may be altered or refined as additionalfeedback is received over time. As part of analysis to manage and usesuch feedback, intelligent selection system 1525 can, in someembodiments, manage A/B testing, where multiple functions are associatedwith a trigger, and the different functions are randomly assigned forincoming trigger requests. Results data derived from this A/B testingcan determine which function provides superior results. For example, atrigger may be associated with input text “calendar please.” In a basicexample, a single associated function from FaaS cloud 1515 may provide alist of scheduled appointments associated with a network device 1505.Feedback received over time may cause an initial function from FaaScloud 1515 to be changed to an appointment creation function. The A/Bexample may randomly assign different network device(s) 1505 to eitherthe schedule reporting function or the appointment creation functionbased on the “calendar please” trigger, and then select the functionthat provides superior results in the system. If network devicepreferences shift over time, thresholds can be established to repeat A/Btesting, or to automatically initiate testing with additional otherfunctions, or multiple different functions (e.g., A/B/C or morefunctions in a single test). Such criteria for automatically reassessingan association between a function and a trigger can be, for example, ifa user (e.g., of network device(s) 1505) provide feedback scores thatfall below a certain level, or if two way communications are identifiedas providing a different function more than a threshold percentage ofthe time following receipt of the “calendar please” trigger.

Intelligent selection system 1525 may include one or more processorsconfigured to execute code that causes one or more machine-learningtechniques or artificial intelligence techniques to intelligently selectassociations between trigger inputs and functions. As described above,triggers can be identified from text (e.g., with natural languageprocessing, etc.) or from actions taken by a system (e.g., initiation ofa two way communication, identification of certain routing paths orsystem loads, repeated two-way communications with a single networkdevice 1505, etc.). In some implementations, intelligent selectionsystem 1525 can execute one or more machine-learning techniques to traina model that predicts whether a message received from network device1505 may be successfully addressed by a given function in FaaS cloud1515.

As another non-limiting example, intelligent selection system 1525 mayreceive a message from network device 1505 through a communicationchannel established or facilitated by communication server 1510 (e.g., anative application configured to enable users to communicate with eachother across various devices). Intelligent selection system 1525 mayevaluate the incoming message according to certain embodiments describedabove. For example, intelligent selection system 1525 may evaluate thecontent (e.g., text, audio clips, images, emoticons, or other suitablecontent) included in the received message using a trainedmachine-learning model. The content of the message can be inputted intothe machine-learning model to generate a predicted function (e.g., aparticular terminal device or bot) or to verify that a predictedfunction is the same function currently associated with a trigger forthe content. The machine-learning model may be continuously trainedbased on feedback signal 1540 received from network device 1505. In someimplementations, intelligent selection system 1525 may request anacknowledgement from network device 1505 of the predicted function. As anon-limiting example, intelligent selection system 1525 may evaluate themessage using a machine-learning technique, and a result of theevaluation may include a function to route or reroute a two waycommunication (e.g., a predication that a particular function or botwithin FaaS 1515 to be associated with a message). To confirm,intelligent selection system 1525 may automatically request feedbacksignal 1540. For example, feedback signal 1540 may include a request fornetwork device 1505 to acknowledge whether the identified function iscorrectly associated with for the message (e.g., “Is Technical Supportthe correct destination?”). If network device 1505 transmits anacknowledgement, then intelligent selection system 1525 may train themachine-learning model to predict that future messages including theexact or similar content (e.g., a threshold of similarity, such as 10percent difference in content) as the received message are to beassociated with the selected function. However, if intelligent selectionsystem 1525 receives feedback signal 1540 indicating that there is anissue with the identified intelligent selection system 1525 can trainthe machine-learning model that future messages with the given triggerbe associated with a different function or bot of FaaS cloud 1515. Insome implementations, intelligent selection system 1525 may notimmediately update or train the machine-learning model, but rather,intelligent selection system 1525 may wait for a threshold number ofincorrect functions, or a threshold set of feedback, before makingupdates.

Message data store 1535 may store some (e.g., but not all) or allmessages received in the past from one or more network devices. Further,message data store 1535 may also store some or all messages transmittedby terminal devices or bots during previous communication sessions withnetwork devices. Message data store 1535 may also store some or allmessages transmitted by network devices to bots during communicationsessions. Further, message data store 1535 may store some or allmessages transmitted by bots to network devices during communicationsessions. In some implementations, message data store 1535 may be adatabase of all messages processed (e.g., transmitted by or received at)communication server 1510.

Message recommendation system 1530 may analyze the database of messagesstored at message data store 1535. In some implementations, messagerecommendation system 1530 may evaluate the messages stored at messagedata store 1535 using one or more machine-learning algorithms orartificial intelligence algorithms. For example, message recommendationsystem 1530 may execute one or more clustering algorithms, such asK-means clustering, means-shift clustering, Density-Based SpatialClustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN) clustering,Expectation-Maximization (EM) Clustering using Gaussian Mixture Models(GMM), and other suitable machine-learning algorithms, on the databaseof messages stored in message data store 1535. In some implementations,a recurrent neural network (RNN) or a convolutional neural network (CNN)may be used to predict response messages to assist the agent. In someimplementations, message recommendation system 1530 may use supportvector machines (SVM), supervised, semi-supervised, ensemble techniques,or unsupervised machine-learning techniques to evaluate all previousmessages to predict responses to incoming messages received from networkdevices during communication sessions. The message recommendation systemcan, in some such examples, automatically generate new triggers andassociated functions. For example, message recommendation system 1530may evaluate the content of messages received from network devices (ormessages received at communication server 1510 from bots or terminaldevices) and compare the results of the evaluation to the one or moreclusters of previous messages or sets of messages for two waycommunications sessions and the functions used during those sessionsstored in message data store 1535. Once the cluster is identified,message recommendation system 1530 can identify the most relevantresponses or functions for given triggers. Such a system canautomatically use data from manual (e.g., agent based) functionselection, to generate new triggers with associated functions based onthe functions selected by agents during historical communication session(e.g., as stored in data store 1535. Message recommendation system 1530can select one or more triggers and associated functions within thecluster of messages based on a confidence threshold. As a non-limitingexample, a confidence algorithm can be executed to generate a confidencescore. A confidence score may be a percentage value where the lower thepercentage, the less likely the response is a good prediction for theincoming message, and the higher the percentage, the more likely theresponse is a good prediction for the incoming message. A minimumconfidence threshold may be defined as a measure of certainty ortrustworthiness associated with each discovered pattern. Further, anexample of a confidence algorithm may be the Apriori Algorithm,similarity algorithms indicating similarity between two data sets, andother suitable confidence algorithms.

FIG. 16 illustrates a computing system architecture 1600 includingvarious components in electrical communication with each other using aconnection 1606, such as a bus, in accordance with some implementations.Example system architecture 1600 includes a processing unit (CPU orprocessor) 1604 and a system connection 1606 that couples various systemcomponents including the system memory 1620, such as ROM 1618 and RAM1616, to the processor 1604. The system architecture 1600 can include acache 1602 of high-speed memory connected directly with, in closeproximity to, or integrated as part of the processor 1604. The systemarchitecture 1600 can copy data from the memory 1620 and/or the storagedevice 1608 to the cache 1602 for quick access by the processor 1604. Inthis way, the cache can provide a performance boost that avoidsprocessor 1604 delays while waiting for data. These and other modulescan control or be configured to control the processor 1604 to performvarious actions.

Other system memory 1620 may be available for use as well. The memory1620 can include multiple different types of memory with differentperformance characteristics. The processor 1604 can include any generalpurpose processor and a hardware or software service, such as service 11610, service 2 1612, and service 3 1614 stored in storage device 1608,configured to control the processor 1604 as well as a special-purposeprocessor where software instructions are incorporated into the actualprocessor design. The processor 1604 may be a completely self-containedcomputing system, containing multiple cores or processors, a bus, memorycontroller, cache, etc. A multi-core processor may be symmetric orasymmetric.

To enable user communication with the computing system architecture1600, an input device 1622 can represent any number of input mechanisms,such as a microphone for speech, a touch-sensitive screen for gesture orgraphical input, keyboard, mouse, motion input, speech and so forth. Anoutput device 1624 can also be one or more of a number of outputmechanisms known to those of skill in the art. In some instances,multimodal systems can enable a user to provide multiple types of inputto communicate with the computing system architecture 1600. Thecommunications interface 1626 can generally govern and control the userinput and system output. There is no restriction on operating on anyparticular hardware arrangement and therefore the basic features heremay easily be substituted for improved hardware or firmware arrangementsas they are developed.

Storage device 1608 is a non-volatile memory and can be a hard disk orother types of computer readable media which can store data that areaccessible by a computer, such as magnetic cassettes, flash memorycards, solid state memory devices, digital versatile disks, cartridges,RAMs 1616, ROM 1618, and hybrids thereof.

The storage device 1608 can include services 1610, 1612, 1614 forcontrolling the processor 1604. Other hardware or software modules arecontemplated. The storage device 1608 can be connected to the systemconnection 1606. In one aspect, a hardware module that performs aparticular function can include the software component stored in acomputer-readable medium in connection with the necessary hardwarecomponents, such as the processor 1604, connection 1606, output device1624, and so forth, to carry out the function.

The disclosed gift selection, attribution, and distribution system canbe performed using a computing system. An example computing system caninclude a processor (e.g., a central processing unit), memory,non-volatile memory, and an interface device. The memory may store dataand/or and one or more code sets, software, scripts, etc. The componentsof the computer system can be coupled together via a bus or through someother known or convenient device. The processor may be configured tocarry out all or part of methods described herein for example byexecuting code for example stored in memory. One or more of a userdevice or computer, a provider server or system, or a suspended databaseupdate system may include the components of the computing system orvariations on such a system.

This disclosure contemplates the computer system taking any suitablephysical form. As example and not by way of limitation, the computersystem may be an embedded computer system, a system-on-chip (SOC), asingle-board computer system (SBC) (such as, for example, acomputer-on-module (COM) or system-on-module (SOM)), a desktop computersystem, a laptop or notebook computer system, an interactive kiosk, amainframe, a mesh of computer systems, a mobile telephone, a personaldigital assistant (PDA), a server, or a combination of two or more ofthese. Where appropriate, the computer system may include one or morecomputer systems; be unitary or distributed; span multiple locations;span multiple machines; and/or reside in a cloud, which may include oneor more cloud components in one or more networks. Where appropriate, oneor more computer systems may perform without substantial spatial ortemporal limitation one or more steps of one or more methods describedor illustrated herein. As an example and not by way of limitation, oneor more computer systems may perform as events occur or in batch modeaggregating multiple events, such as over one or more steps of one ormore methods described or illustrated herein. One or more computersystems may perform at different times or at different locations one ormore steps of one or more methods described or illustrated herein, whereappropriate.

The processor may be, for example, be a conventional microprocessor suchas an Intel Pentium microprocessor or Motorola power PC microprocessor.One of skill in the relevant art will recognize that the terms“machine-readable (storage) medium” or “computer-readable (storage)medium” include any type of device that is accessible by the processor.

The memory can be coupled to the processor by, for example, a bus. Thememory can include, by way of example but not limitation, random accessmemory (RAM), such as dynamic RAM (DRAM) and static RAM (SRAM). Thememory can be local, remote, or distributed.

The bus can also couples the processor to the non-volatile memory anddrive unit. The non-volatile memory is often a magnetic floppy or harddisk, a magnetic-optical disk, an optical disk, a read-only memory(ROM), such as a CD-ROM, EPROM, or EEPROM, a magnetic or optical card,or another form of storage for large amounts of data. Some of this datais often written, by a direct memory access process, into memory duringexecution of software in the computer. The non-volatile storage can belocal, remote, or distributed. The non-volatile memory is optionalbecause systems can be created with all applicable data available inmemory. A typical computer system will usually include at least aprocessor, memory, and a device (e.g., a bus) coupling the memory to theprocessor.

Software can be stored in the non-volatile memory and/or the drive unit.Indeed, for large programs, it may not even be possible to store theentire program in the memory. Nevertheless, it should be understood thatfor software to run, if necessary, it is moved to a computer readablelocation appropriate for processing, and for illustrative purposes, thatlocation is referred to as the memory herein. Even when software ismoved to the memory for execution, the processor can make use ofhardware registers to store values associated with the software, andlocal cache that, ideally, serves to speed up execution. As used herein,a software program is assumed to be stored at any known or convenientlocation (from non-volatile storage to hardware registers), when thesoftware program is referred to as “implemented in a computer-readablemedium.” A processor is considered to be “configured to execute aprogram” when at least one value associated with the program is storedin a register readable by the processor.

The bus can also couples the processor to the network interface device.The interface can include one or more of a modem or network interface.It will be appreciated that a modem or network interface can beconsidered to be part of the computer system. The interface can includean analog modem, Integrated Services Digital network (ISDNO modem, cablemodem, token ring interface, satellite transmission interface (e.g.,“direct PC”), or other interfaces for coupling a computer system toother computer systems. The interface can include one or more inputand/or output (I/O) devices. The I/O devices can include, by way ofexample but not limitation, a keyboard, a mouse or other pointingdevice, disk drives, printers, a scanner, and other input and/or outputdevices, including a display device. The display device can include, byway of example but not limitation, a cathode ray tube (CRT), liquidcrystal display (LCD), or some other applicable known or convenientdisplay device.

In operation, the computer system can be controlled by operating systemsoftware that includes a file routing system, such as a disk operatingsystem. One example of operating system software with associated filerouting system software is the family of operating systems known asWindows® from Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash., and theirassociated file routing systems. Another example of operating systemsoftware with its associated file routing system software is the Linux™operating system and its associated file routing system. The filerouting system can be stored in the non-volatile memory and/or driveunit and can cause the processor to execute the various acts involved bythe operating system to input and output data and to store data in thememory, including storing files on the non-volatile memory and/or driveunit.

Some portions of the detailed description may be presented in terms ofalgorithms and symbolic representations of operations on data bitswithin a computer memory. These algorithmic descriptions andrepresentations are the means used by those skilled in the dataprocessing arts to most effectively convey the substance of their workto others skilled in the art. An algorithm is here, and generally,conceived to be a self-consistent sequence of operations leading to adesired result. The operations are those requiring physicalmanipulations of physical quantities. Usually, though not necessarily,these quantities take the form of electrical or magnetic signals capableof being stored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwisemanipulated. It has proven convenient at times, principally for reasonsof common usage, to refer to these signals as bits, values, elements,symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.

It should be borne in mind, however, that all of these and similar termsare to be associated with the appropriate physical quantities and aremerely convenient labels applied to these quantities. Unless ally statedotherwise as apparent from the following discussion, it is appreciatedthat throughout the description, discussions utilizing terms such as“processing” or “computing” or “calculating” or “determining” or“displaying” or “generating” or the like, refer to the action andprocesses of a computer system, or similar electronic computing device,that manipulates and transforms data represented as physical(electronic) quantities within registers and memories of the computersystem into other data similarly represented as physical quantitieswithin the computer system memories or registers or other suchinformation storage, transmission or display devices.

The algorithms and displays presented herein are not inherently relatedto any particular computer or other apparatus. Various general purposesystems may be used with programs in accordance with the teachingsherein, or it may prove convenient to construct more specializedapparatus to perform the methods of some examples. The involvedstructure for a variety of these systems will appear from thedescription below. In addition, the techniques are not described withreference to any particular programming language, and various examplesmay thus be implemented using a variety of programming languages.

In various implementations, the system operates as a standalone deviceor may be connected (e.g., networked) to other systems. In a networkeddeployment, the system may operate in the capacity of a server or aclient system in a client-server network environment, or as a peersystem in a peer-to-peer (or distributed) network environment.

The system may be a server computer, a client computer, a personalcomputer (PC), a tablet PC, a laptop computer, a set-top box (STB), apersonal digital assistant (PDA), a cellular telephone, an iPhone, aBlackberry, a processor, a telephone, a web appliance, a network router,switch or bridge, or any system capable of executing a set ofinstructions (sequential or otherwise) that specify actions to be takenby that system.

In general, the routines executed to implement the implementations ofthe disclosure, may be implemented as part of an operating system or anapplication, component, program, object, module or sequence ofinstructions referred to as “computer programs.” The computer programstypically include one or more instructions set at various times invarious memory and storage devices in a computer, and that, when readand executed by one or more processing units or processors in acomputer, cause the computer to perform operations to execute elementsinvolving the various aspects of the disclosure.

Moreover, while examples have been described in the context of fullyfunctioning computers and computer systems, those skilled in the artwill appreciate that the various examples are capable of beingdistributed as a program object in a variety of forms, and that thedisclosure applies equally regardless of the particular type of machineor computer-readable media used to actually effect the distribution.

Further examples of machine-readable storage media, machine-readablemedia, or computer-readable (storage) media include but are not limitedto recordable type media such as volatile and non-volatile memorydevices, floppy and other removable disks, hard disk drives, opticaldisks (e.g., Compact Disk Read-Only Memory (CD ROMS), Digital VersatileDisks, (DVDs), etc.), among others, and transmission type media such asdigital and analog communication links.

In some circumstances, operation of a memory device, such as a change instate from a binary one to a binary zero or vice-versa, for example, mayinclude a transformation, such as a physical transformation. Withparticular types of memory devices, such a physical transformation mayinclude a physical transformation of an article to a different state orthing. For example, but without limitation, for some types of memorydevices, a change in state may involve an accumulation and storage ofcharge or a release of stored charge. Likewise, in other memory devices,a change of state may include a physical change or transformation inmagnetic orientation or a physical change or transformation in molecularstructure, such as from crystalline to amorphous or vice versa. Theforegoing is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all examples inwhich a change in state for a binary one to a binary zero or vice-versain a memory device may include a transformation, such as a physicaltransformation. Rather, the foregoing is intended as illustrativeexamples.

A storage medium typically may be non-transitory or include anon-transitory device. In this context, a non-transitory storage mediummay include a device that is tangible, meaning that the device has aconcrete physical form, although the device may change its physicalstate. Thus, for example, non-transitory refers to a device remainingtangible despite this change in state.

The above description and drawings are illustrative and are not to beconstrued as limiting the subject matter to the precise forms disclosed.Persons skilled in the relevant art can appreciate that manymodifications and variations are possible in light of the abovedisclosure. Numerous details are described to provide a thoroughunderstanding of the disclosure. However, in certain instances,well-known or conventional details are not described in order to avoidobscuring the description.

As used herein, the terms “connected,” “coupled,” or any variant thereofwhen applying to modules of a system, means any connection or coupling,either direct or indirect, between two or more elements; the coupling ofconnection between the elements can be physical, logical, or anycombination thereof. Additionally, the words “herein,” “above,” “below,”and words of similar import, when used in this application, shall referto this application as a whole and not to any particular portions ofthis application. Where the context permits, words in the above DetailedDescription using the singular or plural number may also include theplural or singular number respectively. The word “or,” in reference to alist of two or more items, covers all of the following interpretationsof the word: any of the items in the list, all of the items in the list,or any combination of the items in the list.

Those of skill in the art will appreciate that the disclosed subjectmatter may be embodied in other forms and manners not shown below. It isunderstood that the use of relational terms, if any, such as first,second, top and bottom, and the like are used solely for distinguishingone entity or action from another, without necessarily requiring orimplying any such actual relationship or order between such entities oractions.

While processes or blocks are presented in a given order, alternativeimplementations may perform routines having steps, or employ systemshaving blocks, in a different order, and some processes or blocks may bedeleted, moved, added, subdivided, substituted, combined, and/ormodified to provide alternative or sub combinations. Each of theseprocesses or blocks may be implemented in a variety of different ways.Also, while processes or blocks are at times shown as being performed inseries, these processes or blocks may instead be performed in parallel,or may be performed at different times. Further any numbers noted hereinare only examples: alternative implementations may employ differingvalues or ranges.

The teachings of the disclosure provided herein can be applied to othersystems, not necessarily the system described above. The elements andacts of the various examples described above can be combined to providefurther examples.

Any patents and applications and other references noted above, includingany that may be listed in accompanying filing papers, are incorporatedherein by reference. Aspects of the disclosure can be modified, ifnecessary, to employ the systems, functions, and concepts of the variousreferences described above to provide yet further examples of thedisclosure.

These and other changes can be made to the disclosure in light of theabove Detailed Description. While the above description describescertain examples, and describes the best mode contemplated, no matterhow detailed the above appears in text, the teachings can be practicedin many ways. Details of the system may vary considerably in itsimplementation details, while still being encompassed by the subjectmatter disclosed herein. As noted above, particular terminology usedwhen describing certain features or aspects of the disclosure should notbe taken to imply that the terminology is being redefined herein to berestricted to any characteristics, features, or aspects of thedisclosure with which that terminology is associated. In general, theterms used in the following claims should not be construed to limit thedisclosure to the implementations disclosed in the specification, unlessthe above Detailed Description section explicitly defines such terms.Accordingly, the actual scope of the disclosure encompasses not only thedisclosed implementations, but also all equivalent ways of practicing orimplementing the disclosure under the claims.

While certain aspects of the disclosure are presented below in certainclaim forms, the inventors contemplate the various aspects of thedisclosure in any number of claim forms. Any claims intended to betreated under 35 U.S.C. § 152(f) will begin with the words “means for”.Accordingly, the applicant reserves the right to add additional claimsafter filing the application to pursue such additional claim forms forother aspects of the disclosure.

The terms used in this specification generally have their ordinarymeanings in the art, within the context of the disclosure, and in thecontext where each term is used. Certain terms that are used to describethe disclosure are discussed above, or elsewhere in the specification,to provide additional guidance to the practitioner regarding thedescription of the disclosure. For convenience, certain terms may behighlighted, for example using capitalization, italics, and/or quotationmarks. The use of highlighting has no influence on the scope and meaningof a term; the scope and meaning of a term is the same, in the samecontext, whether or not it is highlighted. It will be appreciated thatsame element can be described in more than one way.

Consequently, alternative language and synonyms may be used for any oneor more of the terms discussed herein, nor is any special significanceto be placed upon whether or not a term is elaborated or discussedherein. Synonyms for certain terms are provided. A recital of one ormore synonyms does not exclude the use of other synonyms. The use ofexamples anywhere in this specification including examples of any termsdiscussed herein is illustrative only, and is not intended to furtherlimit the scope and meaning of the disclosure or of any exemplifiedterm. Likewise, the disclosure is not limited to various examples givenin this specification.

Without intent to further limit the scope of the disclosure, examples ofinstruments, apparatus, methods and their related results according tothe examples of the present disclosure are given below. Note that titlesor subtitles may be used in the examples for convenience of a reader,which in no way should limit the scope of the disclosure. Unlessotherwise defined, all technical and scientific terms used herein havethe same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill in theart to which this disclosure pertains. In the case of conflict, thepresent document, including definitions will control.

Some portions of this description describe examples in terms ofalgorithms and symbolic representations of operations on information.These algorithmic descriptions and representations are commonly used bythose skilled in the data processing arts to convey the substance oftheir work effectively to others skilled in the art. These operations,while described functionally, computationally, or logically, areunderstood to be implemented by computer programs or equivalentelectrical circuits, microcode, or the like. Furthermore, it has alsoproven convenient at times, to refer to these arrangements of operationsas modules, without loss of generality. The described operations andtheir associated modules may be embodied in software, firmware,hardware, or any combinations thereof.

Any of the steps, operations, or processes described herein may beperformed or implemented with one or more hardware or software modules,alone or in combination with other devices. In some examples, a softwaremodule is implemented with a computer program object including acomputer-readable medium containing computer program code, which can beexecuted by a computer processor for performing any or all of the steps,operations, or processes described.

Examples may also relate to an apparatus for performing the operationsherein. This apparatus may be specially constructed for the involvedpurposes, and/or it may include a general-purpose computing deviceselectively activated or reconfigured by a computer program stored inthe computer. Such a computer program may be stored in a non-transitory,tangible computer readable storage medium, or any type of media suitablefor storing electronic instructions, which may be coupled to a computersystem bus. Furthermore, any computing systems referred to in thespecification may include a single processor or may be architecturesemploying multiple processor designs for increased computing capability.

Examples may also relate to an object that is produced by a computingprocess described herein. Such an object may include informationresulting from a computing process, where the information is stored on anon-transitory, tangible computer readable storage medium and mayinclude any implementation of a computer program object or other datacombination described herein.

The language used in the specification has been principally selected forreadability and instructional purposes, and it may not have beenselected to delineate or circumscribe the subject matter. It istherefore intended that the scope of this disclosure be limited not bythis detailed description, but rather by any claims that issue on anapplication based hereon. Accordingly, the disclosure of the examples isintended to be illustrative, but not limiting, of the scope of thesubject matter, which is set forth in the following claims.

details were given in the preceding description to provide a thoroughunderstanding of various implementations of systems and components for acontextual connection system. It will be understood by one of ordinaryskill in the art, however, that the implementations described above maybe practiced without these details. For example, circuits, systems,networks, processes, and other components may be shown as components inblock diagram form in order not to obscure the examples in unnecessarydetail. In other instances, well-known circuits, processes, algorithms,structures, and techniques may be shown without unnecessary detail inorder to avoid obscuring the examples.

It is also noted that individual implementations may be described as aprocess which is depicted as a flowchart, a flow diagram, a data flowdiagram, a structure diagram, or a block diagram. Although a flowchartmay describe the operations as a sequential process, many of theoperations can be performed in parallel or concurrently. In addition,the order of the operations may be re-arranged. A process is terminatedwhen its operations are completed, but could have additional steps notincluded. A process may correspond to a method, a function, a procedure,a subroutine, a subprogram, etc. When a process corresponds to afunction, its termination can correspond to a return of the function tothe calling function or the main function.

Client devices, network devices, and other devices can be computingsystems that include one or more integrated circuits, input devices,output devices, data storage devices, and/or network interfaces, amongother things. The integrated circuits can include, for example, one ormore processors, volatile memory, and/or non-volatile memory, amongother things. The input devices can include, for example, a keyboard, amouse, a key pad, a touch interface, a microphone, a camera, and/orother types of input devices. The output devices can include, forexample, a display screen, a speaker, a haptic feedback system, aprinter, and/or other types of output devices. A data storage device,such as a hard drive or flash memory, can enable the computing device totemporarily or permanently store data. A network interface, such as awireless or wired interface, can enable the computing device tocommunicate with a network. Examples of computing devices includedesktop computers, laptop computers, server computers, hand-heldcomputers, tablets, smart phones, personal digital assistants, digitalhome assistants, as well as machines and apparatuses in which acomputing device has been incorporated.

The term “computer-readable medium” includes, but is not limited to,portable or non-portable storage devices, optical storage devices, andvarious other mediums capable of storing, containing, or carryinginstruction(s) and/or data. A computer-readable medium may include anon-transitory medium in which data can be stored and that does notinclude carrier waves and/or transitory electronic signals propagatingwirelessly or over wired connections. Examples of a non-transitorymedium may include, but are not limited to, a magnetic disk or tape,optical storage media such as compact disk (CD) or digital versatiledisk (DVD), flash memory, memory or memory devices. A computer-readablemedium may have stored thereon code and/or machine-executableinstructions that may represent a procedure, a function, a subprogram, aprogram, a routine, a subroutine, a module, a software package, a class,or any combination of instructions, data structures, or programstatements. A code segment may be coupled to another code segment or ahardware circuit by passing and/or receiving information, data,arguments, parameters, or memory contents. Information, arguments,parameters, data, etc. may be passed, forwarded, or transmitted via anysuitable means including memory sharing, message passing, token passing,network transmission, or the like.

The various examples discussed above may further be implemented byhardware, software, firmware, middleware, microcode, hardwaredescription languages, or any combination thereof. When implemented insoftware, firmware, middleware or microcode, the program code or codesegments to perform the necessary tasks (e.g., a computer-programproduct) may be stored in a computer-readable or machine-readablestorage medium (e.g., a medium for storing program code or codesegments). A processor(s), implemented in an integrated circuit, mayperform the necessary tasks.

The program code may be executed by a processor, which may include oneor more processors, such as one or more digital signal processors(DSPs), general purpose microprocessors, an application integratedcircuits (ASICs), field programmable logic arrays (FPGAs), or otherequivalent integrated or discrete logic circuitry. Such a processor maybe configured to perform any of the techniques described in thisdisclosure. A general purpose processor may be a microprocessor; but inthe alternative, the processor may be any conventional processor,controller, microcontroller, or state machine. A processor may also beimplemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combinationof a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one ormore microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other suchconfiguration. Accordingly, the term “processor,” as used herein mayrefer to any of the foregoing structure, any combination of theforegoing structure, or any other structure or apparatus suitable forimplementation of the techniques described herein. In addition, in someaspects, the functionality described herein may be provided withindedicated software modules or hardware modules configured forimplementing a suspended database update system.

Where components are described as being “configured to” perform certainoperations, such configuration can be accomplished, for example, bydesigning electronic circuits or other hardware to perform theoperation, by programming programmable electronic circuits (e.g.,microprocessors, or other suitable electronic circuits) to perform theoperation, or any combination thereof.

The various illustrative logical blocks, modules, circuits, andalgorithm steps described in connection with the implementationsdisclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware, computersoftware, firmware, or combinations thereof. To clearly illustrate thisinterchangeability of hardware and software, various illustrativecomponents, blocks, modules, circuits, and steps have been describedabove generally in terms of their functionality. Whether suchfunctionality is implemented as hardware or software depends upon theparticular application and design constraints imposed on the overallsystem. Skilled artisans may implement the described functionality invarying ways for each particular application, but such implementationdecisions should not be interpreted as causing a departure from thescope of the present disclosure.

The foregoing detailed description of the technology has been presentedfor purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to beexhaustive or to limit the technology to the precise form disclosed.Many modifications and variations are possible in light of the aboveteaching. The described examples were chosen in order to best explainthe principles of the technology, its practical application, and toenable others skilled in the art to utilize the technology in variousexamples and with various modifications as are suited to the particularuse contemplated. It is intended that the scope of the technology bedefined by the claim.

1. (canceled)
 2. A computer-implemented method comprising: receiving, ata serverless cloud-based system, a function call including transmittedcode associated with a serverless cloud-based function, wherein thefunction call is associated with an event trigger from a two-waycommunication session between a user device and a communication server;dynamically allocating processing resources of the serverlesscloud-based system for execution of the transmitted code; executing thetransmitted code using the processing resources allocated for theserverless cloud-based function, wherein executing the transmitted codeincludes generating outputs of the serverless cloud-based function; andtransmitting the outputs of the serverless cloud-based function, whereinwhen the outputs are transmitted to the communication server, theoutputs are integrated into the two-way communication session.
 3. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the function callfurther includes data from the two-way communication session, whereinexecuting the transmitted code further includes analyzing the data fromthe two-way communication session to generate the outputs.
 4. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, further comprising: continuouslyreceiving update data associated with the serverless cloud-basedfunction and the two-way communication session; and generating updatedoutput data based on the update data, wherein executing the transmittedcode comprises analyzing the update data in to generate the updatedoutput data; and transmitting the updated output data.
 5. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, further comprising: receiving afunction termination trigger; permanenting execution of the transmittedcode in response to the function termination trigger; and deleting thetransmitted code from the serverless cloud-based system.
 6. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, further comprising: receiving afunction termination trigger; permanenting execution of the transmittedcode in response to the function termination trigger; storing thetransmitted code from the serverless cloud-based system; receiving asecond function call associated with the serverless cloud-based functionand a second two-way communication session; and executing thetransmitted code stored in the serverless cloud-based system for thesecond two-way communication session.
 7. The computer-implemented methodof claim 2, wherein the transmitted code includes custom logic todevelop a conversational experience for the two-way communicationsession in response to a conversation started event.
 8. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the transmitted codeassociated with the serverless cloud-based function includes customlogic to develop a conversational experience for the two-waycommunication session in response to a survey submitted event.
 9. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein the transmitted codeassociated with the serverless cloud-based function provides real-timenatural language processing for a specialized topic associated with thetwo-way communication session.
 10. A system comprising: memory; and oneor more processors of a serverless cloud-based system coupled to thememory, the one or more processors configured to perform operationscomprising: receiving a function call including transmitted codeassociated with a serverless cloud-based function, wherein the functioncall is associated with an event trigger from a two-way communicationsession between a user device and a communication server; dynamicallyallocating processing resources of the serverless cloud-based system forexecution of the transmitted code; executing the transmitted code usingthe processing resources allocated for the serverless cloud-basedfunction, wherein executing the transmitted code includes generatingoutputs of the serverless cloud-based function; and transmitting theoutputs of the serverless cloud-based function, wherein when the outputsare transmitted to the communication server, the outputs are integratedinto the two-way communication session.
 11. The system of claim 10,wherein the function call further includes data from the two-waycommunication session, wherein executing the transmitted code furtherincludes analyzing the data from the two-way communication session togenerate the outputs.
 12. The system of claim 10, wherein the one ormore processors are configured for operations further comprising:continuously receiving update data associated with the serverlesscloud-based function and the two-way communication session; andgenerating updated output data based on the update data, whereinexecuting the transmitted code comprises analyzing the update data in togenerate the updated output data; and transmitting the updated outputdata.
 13. The system of claim 10, wherein the one or more processors areconfigured for operations further comprising: receiving a functiontermination trigger; permanenting execution of the transmitted code inresponse to the function termination trigger; and deleting thetransmitted code from the serverless cloud-based system.
 14. The systemof claim 10, wherein the one or more processors are configured foroperations further comprising: receiving a function termination trigger;permanenting execution of the transmitted code in response to thefunction termination trigger; storing the transmitted code from theserverless cloud-based system; receiving a second function callassociated with the serverless cloud-based function and a second two-waycommunication session; and executing the transmitted code stored in theserverless cloud-based system for the second two-way communicationsession.
 15. The system of claim 10, wherein the transmitted codeincludes custom logic to develop a conversational experience for thetwo-way communication session in response to a conversation startedevent.
 16. The system of claim 10, wherein the transmitted codeassociated with the serverless cloud-based function includes customlogic to develop a conversational experience for the two-waycommunication session in response to a survey submitted event.
 17. Thesystem of claim 10, wherein the transmitted code associated with theserverless cloud-based function provides real-time natural languageprocessing for a specialized topic associated with the two-waycommunication session.
 18. A non-transitory computer readable storagemedium comprising instructions that, when executed by one or moreprocessors of a serverless cloud-based system, cause performance ofoperations comprising: receiving a function call including transmittedcode associated with a serverless cloud-based function, wherein thefunction call is associated with an event trigger from a two-waycommunication session between a user device and a communication server;dynamically allocating processing resources of the serverlesscloud-based system for execution of the transmitted code; executing thetransmitted code using the processing resources allocated for theserverless cloud-based function, wherein executing the transmitted codeincludes generating outputs of the serverless cloud-based function; andtransmitting the outputs of the serverless cloud-based function, whereinwhen the outputs are transmitted to the communication server, theoutputs are integrated into the two-way communication session.
 19. Thenon-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein thefunction call further includes data from the two-way communicationsession, wherein executing the transmitted code further includesanalyzing the data from the two-way communication session to generatethe outputs.
 20. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium ofclaim 18, wherein the instructions cause performance of operationsfurther comprising: continuously receiving update data associated withthe serverless cloud-based function and the two-way communicationsession; and generating updated output data based on the update data,wherein executing the transmitted code comprises analyzing the updatedata in to generate the updated output data; and transmitting theupdated output data.
 21. The non-transitory computer readable storagemedium of claim 18, wherein the instructions cause performance ofoperations further comprising: receiving a function termination trigger;permanenting execution of the transmitted code in response to thefunction termination trigger; and deleting the transmitted code from theserverless cloud-based system.
 22. The non-transitory computer readablestorage medium of claim 18, wherein the instructions cause performanceof operations further comprising: receiving a function terminationtrigger; permanenting execution of the transmitted code in response tothe function termination trigger; storing the transmitted code from theserverless cloud-based system; receiving a second function callassociated with the serverless cloud-based function and a second two-waycommunication session; and executing the transmitted code stored in theserverless cloud-based system for the second two-way communicationsession.
 23. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium ofclaim 18, wherein the transmitted code includes custom logic to developa conversational experience for the two-way communication session inresponse to a conversation started event.
 24. The non-transitorycomputer readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the transmittedcode associated with the serverless cloud-based function includes customlogic to develop a conversational experience for the two-waycommunication session in response to a survey submitted event.
 25. Thenon-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein thetransmitted code associated with the serverless cloud-based functionprovides real-time natural language processing for a specialized topicassociated with the two-way communication session.